Medical and environmental officials in the Obuasi Municipality are battling to control a cholera outbreak that has claimed one life and left more than 50 people hospitalised. The disease broke out last Monday with patients reporting with symptoms at medical establishments in the municipality. Doctors at five local hospitals Anglo Gold Ashanti, SDA, Obuasi Municipal, St. Jude and the Bryant Mission hospitals – where the patients are receiving treatment, have been working hard to prevent more deaths. Symptoms patients carried to the hospitals included severe diarrhea and vomiting, some accompanied by severe dehydration. The Obuasi Municipal Disease Control Officer, Mr Philip Aboagye, told the Daily Graphic yesterday that a team of health officials from Kumasi had been at Obuasi to assess the situation to find the way forward. “We have just completed a meeting with the Kumasi team and visited patients in hospitals trying to assess the situation and see what to do next,” he said. Obuasi, a major mining community, is currently suffering from sanitation inadequacies resulting from the breakdown of some of the municipal assembly’s skip loaders. The municipal environmental officer, Mr Sampson Owusu-Ansah, confirmed the sanitation challenge, saying that there had been spillovers at some refuse collection points since the weekend because two of the assembly’s four skip loaders were not functioning.
Biohazard name:
Cholera
Biohazard level:
2/4 Medium
Biohazard desc.:
Bacteria and viruses that cause only mild disease to humans, or are difficult to contract via aerosol in a lab setting, such as hepatitis A, B, and C, influenza A, Lyme disease, salmonella, mumps, measles, scrapie, dengue fever, and HIV. “Routine diagnostic work with clinical specimens can be done safely at Biosafety Level 2, using Biosafety Level 2 practices and procedures. Research work (including co-cultivation, virus replication studies, or manipulations involving concentrated virus) can be done in a BSL-2 (P2) facility, using BSL-3 practices and procedures. Virus production activities, including virus concentrations, require a BSL-3 (P3) facility and use of BSL-3 practices and procedures”, see Recommended Biosafety Levels for Infectious Agents.
Volcanic activity on Spain’s El Hierro island has resumed far below the Earth’s surface in a similar manner to last July, albeit slightly stronger, the director of the National Geographic Institute, or IGN, in the Canary Islands, Maria Jose Blanco, told Efe on Sunday.
Blanco said that a peak of seismic activity is under way, a continuation of the volcanic process – a shifting of magma many kilometers (miles) under ground – that began in July 2011 which, although the main activity ended at the time with an undersea eruption, that did not mean that the overall activity had come to a definitive conclusion.
The IGN official said that at present it is not expected that the seismic movements that have been registered – which have occurred at depths of some 20 kilometers (about 12.5 miles) – exceed 3.2 on the Richter scale, a fairly low level.
Blanco could not specify how long this new round of activity would last, although she did say that seismic peaks like the current one would, in all likelihood, continue to occur.
Therefore, she said, the IGN is studying the idea of convening the scientific committee of the Civil Protection Plan for Volcanic Risk in the Canaries after this reactivation in the depths of the El Hierro volcano, where over the past three days more than 330 minor seismic movements have been registered.
Officials with the regional government of the Canaries told Efe that experts had verified “an acceleration of released seismic energy accompanied by deformations” in underground structures.
For the present, the largest movement registered so far was the one measured at 3.2 on the Richter scale, which was felt on Saturday for some 13 hours and 15 minutes by the residents of the municipality of El Pinar, according to IGN data.
A slight increase of activity can be noted at Popocatépetl volcano in Mexico. The frequency of explosions has increased to more than 1 per hour, i.e. doubled when compared to last week.
The more energetic explosions produced small ash plumes rising up to 1 km. Episodes of volcanic tremor occurred as well, CENAPRED writes.
The new seismic swarm at El Hierro continues with hundreds of small quakes per day concentrated at about 20 km depth in the south-central part of the island near El Pinar. Pulses of tremor and a slight inflation are visible as well, but for now, it seems that magma is not moving much.
San Cristobal volcano had a small explosion yesterday at 8:17 am local time. Recent measurements showed an increase of SO2 emissions to 2,490 tons per day, i.e. almost double than before. Also, seismic tremor increased in the evening of 15 Sep.
Fuego volcano, Guatemala: Activity remains at normal levels with sporadic weak to moderate explosions with ash rising 400-800 meters and some rumbling sounds. The lava flow to the Taniluya canyon has apparently decreased a lot, as INSIVUMEH reported it to be only 50 m long yesterday.
Santiaguito volcano continues to have occasional explosions ejecting ash columns to 500 meters height, which spread west and northwest over the region of the villages of El Rosario and San Marcos, Palajunoj. There is constant activity in the 4 active lava flows, generating avalanches of blocks deposited within the river banks Nima Nima I and II.
Most other volcanoes in Central and Southern America have not shown any significantly unusual behavior.
Satellite observations: Batu Tara had its daily explosion to send ash to about 7,000 ft altitude, VAAC Darwin reports.
A strong SO2 plume was visible from Manam volcano (PNG) today, suggesting that there is heightened activity or an eruption.
Sakurajima volcano seems to be having a break from its relatively strong phase over the past days. There was only one probably weak explosion reported during the past 24 hours.
Smoke and ash billow from North Maluku’s Gamalama on Sunday. (Antara Photo/Rosa Panggabean)
Two of Indonesia’s most active volcanoes erupted on Saturday, prompting the government to issue warnings to populations living near the affected mountains.
The National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB) said on Sunday that new eruption started at Lokon in North Sulawesi and Gamalama at Ternate in North Maluku.
Lokon generated a 1,500-meter high ash plume and violent strombolian (low-level) activity with some lava flow, while Gamalama produced a shower of ashes that covered the nearby city.
Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, a spokesman for BNPB, said on Sunday that Lokon, located in North Sulawesi’s Tomohon area, erupted at 7 p.m. on Saturday.
The explosion from the eruption shattered windows of the command post built to monitor the activities of the volcano, he said.
The agency, Sutopo said, had issued warnings to local administrations to prepare precautionary measures, and called on people to remain alert.
“The residents don’t have to be evacuated but they must not do any activities within the range of five kilometers from the volcano,” Sutopo said.
He said that the BNPB had asked the Tomohon administration to raise the awareness of residents.
Meanwhile, the Gamalama spurt sent ashes into the air for about 15 minutes at 11 p.m., before the wind carried the ashes toward the North Maluku capital of Ternate. “The ashes came down on the city, decreasing visibility to only 50 meters,” Sutopo said.
He said BNPB’s local branch went to the affected area and set up four stations to help people in the event of a larger eruption. “Here also, we don’t see any need to evacuate people. But we will stay on high alert,” the official said.
Lokon has erupted several times previously, with an explosion in July 2011 forcing more than 5,200 people to be evacuated.
The eruption created huge clouds of ash as high as 3,500 meters.
Lokon’s last deadly eruption was in 1991, when a Swiss tourist was killed.
Last December, Gamalama erupted, resulting in four villagers being killed and dozens others being hospitalized. About 1,000 residents were forced to evacuate.
The Indonesian archipelago has dozens of active volcanoes and straddles major tectonic fault lines known as the “Ring of Fire” between the Pacific and Indian oceans.
Earlier this month, there was volcanic activity at Lampung’s Anak Krakatau.
Nicaragua boosted its responses to volcanic activity in the northwestern region Saturday, as the San Cristobal volcano acted up for the second time in a week. Authorities installed 43 radio communication stations along the Pacific coast to monitor San Cristobal and another volcano, Telica. The radio posts aim to “ensure improved monitoring of seismic and volcanic behavior in the area,” said civil defense chief Colonel Nestor Solis, enabling authorities to issue more accurate warnings sooner. A number of towns near San Cristobal, located some 135 kilometers (83 miles) northwest of the capital, were evacuated last week after the volcano began rumbling, sending a column of smoke and ash high into the sky, before subsiding. On Saturday, the 1,745-meter (5,725-foot) tall volcano again spewed “abundant gas emissions moving toward the northeast” and increased seismic tremor and sulfur concentrations, according to the Nicaraguan Institute of Territorial Studies, or INETER. Sulfur dioxide monitoring showed levels of the compound — considered a measure of volcanic activity — were nearly double the readings from previous days, said the director of national disaster prevention and relief agency SINAPRED, Guillermo Gonzalez.
Taal volcano’s seismic network detected one volcanic earthquake during the past 24-hour observation period. Steaming activity and crater glow could not be observed due to thick clouds covering the volcano’s summit the whole day yesterday up to this morning,
Mayon Volcano’s seismic network detected one volcanic earthquake during the past 24-hour observation period. Steaming activity and crater glow could not be observed due to thick clouds covering the volcano’s summit the whole day yesterday up to this morning,
A volcano has erupted in eastern Indonesia, spewing clouds of thick, gray ash. There were no immediate reports of injuries or damage. State volcanologist Kristianto says Mount Gamalama in the Molucca Islands sprang to life last week. It unleashed two strong eruptions over the weekend, sending volcanic ash as high as 1 kilometer (0.62 miles). Kristianto, who uses only one name, says slow-moving red lava was visible at the peak of the eruption Monday. Villages have been blanketed with thick ash but no evacuations have been ordered. Gamalama last erupted late last year, and its mudflows killed four villagers two weeks later. Indonesia is a vast archipelago with millions of people living on mountains or near fertile flood plains. Seasonal downpours here often cause landslides.
[This event happened on friday, 14.09.2012] The nuclear reactor at Seabrook Station has been powered down since Friday evening, when a water intake valve was jammed closed by a computer glitch, according to an announcement by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Water sank to a “low low level” inside one of Seabrook Station’s four steam generators on Friday, Sept. 14, after the valve problem occurred, according to an NRC inspector who was called to the scene. The low water level tripped an automatic shutdown of the reactor at approximately 8:25 p.m. The NRC inspector’s report indicates a computer card controlling the feedwater regulator valve failed. All other systems performed as expected after the reactor process stopped, according to the NRC inspector’s report. “One of our resident inspectors assigned to Seabrook traveled to the site Friday night to independently verify that the shutdown was being safely and effectively carried out and did not identify any concerns,” NRC spokesman Neil Sheehan wrote in an email announcement Monday. A report created by the NRC inspector indicates “emergency feedwater” was “actuated” because of low water levels in the steam generator. Al Griffith, a spokesman for the operators of Seabrook Station, Next Era Energy, said the plant was scheduled to power down on Sunday for a “refueling outage.” The event on Friday led them to begin the refueling outage early, he said. “Because we were entering a refueling outage anyway, we’ll keep the plant down,” Griffith said.
Six people have died from the cholera outbreak in parts of the Volta Region. Five of the deaths were recorded in Akatsi South while the sixth death was recorded in Adidome in the Central Tongu District. Four Electoral Areas in the Akatsi District are all battling with the disease.The Assemblyman for the Wute Electoral Area, Sammy Wuadi, said the cholera outbreak did not come as a surprise and that the people are being conscientised to keep their surroundings clean. According to Mr Wuadi, the situation is gradually abating following the strategies put in place by the Environmental Health Directorate to forestall the spread. A Senior Environmental Health Assistant in the Akatsi South District, Ms Akua Dzaka also stated that residents are being advised to desist from drinking from the Tordji River which is believed to have been contaminated. “We suspect that that is the source of the cholera outbreak and we are also educating them to take good care of the food that they eat,” she said.
Biohazard name:
Cholera
Biohazard level:
2/4 Medium
Biohazard desc.:
Bacteria and viruses that cause only mild disease to humans, or are difficult to contract via aerosol in a lab setting, such as hepatitis A, B, and C, influenza A, Lyme disease, salmonella, mumps, measles, scrapie, dengue fever, and HIV. “Routine diagnostic work with clinical specimens can be done safely at Biosafety Level 2, using Biosafety Level 2 practices and procedures. Research work (including co-cultivation, virus replication studies, or manipulations involving concentrated virus) can be done in a BSL-2 (P2) facility, using BSL-3 practices and procedures. Virus production activities, including virus concentrations, require a BSL-3 (P3) facility and use of BSL-3 practices and procedures”, see Recommended Biosafety Levels for Infectious Agents.
The Ebola virus has taken the Congo by storm, killing 31 people in the northeast part of the country. Another 38 people have the disease, sending alarm bells off in the World Health Organization. The total number dead has doubled over the past week, and workers are worried that having traditional funerals might increase the spread of the disease among those in attendance. There is no cure for Ebola and the disease kills 40 to 90 percent of those infected. It is also painful, leading to severe internal bleeding.
El Paso County health officials announced Friday, September 14, that a wild rabbit found on the northeast side of Colorado Springs has been laboratory-confirmed positive for Yersinia pestis, the cause of plague. This comes on the heels of a Pagosa Springs girl who contracted the plague and recovered from the disease. El Paso Countyâs last reported human case occurred in 1991. An El Paso County Public Health news release Friday says the animal was found is East of Powers Boulevard near the St. Francis Medical Center/Hospital. Of utmost importance is the risk to the human population in the area. Infectious disease experts are conducting an investigation to determine potential human exposures and to assess the general area for additional plague concerns. The people exposed have been identified and have been given preventive antibiotics to prevent plague from developing.
A rare disease suspected to be of âscrub typhusâ has claimed 30 lives, in Alwar district of Rajasthan this season. Another six have died due to a disease with similar symptoms in Dausa. Concerned over the high death count recorded since August 22 this year, the health department has sought the help of National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) based in New Delhi. A team has reached the spot to collect blood samples, according to official sources. Scrub typhus can be cured but only if it is timely diagnosed. It is caused by the bite of mites especially during the monsoon season and is reported in areas close to jungles or urban shrubs. Since fever is one of the early symptoms of this disease, wrong or delayed diagnosis is a major worry. Residents claim that the death toll is over 50 but chief medical health officer (CMHO) in Alwar, Dr K K Meena, puts the official figure at 30. In Dausa, six people died recently after showing similar symptoms as scrub typhus which includes high fever and low platelet count. âIn the initial investigation, we have found that some of them had low platelet count accompanied by fever,â said Dr O P Bairwa, CMHO, Dausa.
Halliburton has lost a seven-inch radioactive rod somewhere in the Texas desert. The National Guard has been called in to help to find the device, which employees of the controversial US oilfield services company lost a week ago. The rod, which contains americium-241/beryllium and is stamped with a radiation warning symbol with the words “Danger Radioactive: Do not handle. Notify civil authorities if found”, was lost during a 130-mile journey between oil well sites in Pecos and Odessa last Tuesday. The US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) warned that the radioactive material “could cause permanent injury to a person who handled them”. The agency said americium-241/beryllium, known as Am-241, is a “category 3″ source of radiation and would normally have to be held for some hours before causing health problems.But the NRC still warned that “it could possibly â although it is unlikely â be fatal to be close to this amount of unshielded radioactive material for a period of days to weeks”. A spokeswoman for the NRC said the agency could not remember the last time a radioactive rod went missing. “[There has] never been one lost in the public domain,” she said. The spokeswoman added that there was a concern the radioactive material could fall into the hands of terrorists. The route the Halliburton truck took between Pecos and Odessa has been painstakingly searched with radioactive detection gear three times with assistance from local police and the National Guard. “When the crew went to remove the Am-241 source they discovered the source transport container lock and plug were not in place and that the source was missing,” the NRC said in its report into the incident. “The crew returned to the well site near Pecos and searched for the source, but did not find it. The radiation safety officer stated that the lock was found in the storage compartment in the back of the truck. The transport container plug was not in the container.”The three-man Halliburton crew, who had been using the rod to identify oil and gas deposits suitable for fracking, have been questioned by the FBI. The NRC said Halliburton was carrying out a forensic search of the truck. “They are literally stripping it down, removing every piece of equipment looking for the source,” the agency said. Halliburton said it would offer a reward to anyone who finds the rod but cautioned the public to stay at least 25ft away from the device.
A 63-year-old man died Sunday in the Czech Republic after drinking bootleg spirits tainted with methanol, bringing the death toll from an outbreak of alcohol poisoning to 20, hospital staff said. The man was found unconscious Friday at a railway station in the eastern town of Prerov and was hospitalised in a very serious condition. “Despite their efforts, doctors were unable to save him. The man died today a little before noon,” hospital spokeswoman Hana Szotkovska said. Eastern regions of the country have been hit hardest by what Czech experts describe as the worst wave of alcohol poisoning in three decades, but a first case has also been reported in the capital Prague. Around 40 people remained in hospital Sunday from the outbreak, which claimed its first two victims on September 6 and prompted the health minister on Friday to ban the sale of liquor with an alcohol content of over 20 percent. Poland, which borders eastern Czech Republic, on Sunday banned the sale of all alcohol manufactured by its neighbour, except for beer and wine. Czech police have to date charged 22 people in connection with the case. On Friday, they raided thousands of bars, restaurants and shops across the country for traces of bootleg alcohol. Czech police chief Martin Cervicek spoke Sunday of progress in the investigation, telling public radio station CRo1 that officers were on the trail of those who may have supplied the material used to manufacture the spirits.
Sixteen people are trapped after a tunnel along the Daqing-Guangzhou Expressway collapsed Sunday night in east China’s Jiangxi Province, local authorities said Monday. The tunnel, which is still under construction, collapsed at around 10 p.m. in Longnan County in the city of Ganzhou, said rescuers. By Monday noon, the trapped people still had not been found. The tunnel is part of the 3,429 km-expressway that spans from northeast China’s Heilongjiang Province all the way to southern Guangdong Province.
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Weak but frequent explosions occur at Fuego volcano in Guatemala. On 25-26 July, they were producing gray ash columns reaching heights of 300 m to 600 m, and drifting up to 12 km west, northwest and southwest.
The explosions ejected incandescent material to heights of 100 to 150 m above the crater and generated weak avalanches on the upper crater flanks with rumbling and jetting sounds. Weak glow is seen at the crater at night.
The lava flow toward Taniluyá canyon reaches 400 meters in length. A new lava flow is active toward Ceniza (“ash”) Canyon and has reached 200 m length, and from both flows, glowing lava blocks roll down the flanks and reach the vegetation. A third lava flow was observed in the direction of the Lajas Canyon with a length of 600 m.
Weak avalanches from the summit area were directed toward Canyon Santa Teresa and reached about 300 m distance and lifted up light ash clouds.
The number of people taken to hospitals by ambulance due to heatstroke in the week through Sunday more than doubled from the preceding week to 5,467, preliminary data showed Tuesday. The figure, up from 2,622 in the week to July 15, hit the highest for a single week this summer, according to the data released by the Fire and Disaster Management Agency. Deaths caused by heatstroke increased to 13 from five in the preceding week. Tokyo and Saitama Prefecture had the most victims, with ambulances called for 388 people each. They were followed by 382 in Aichi Prefecture and 372 in Osaka Prefecture. People aged 65 or older accounted for 45.9 percent of the total. Since the agency started this year’s survey on May 28, 11,116 people were taken to hospitals as of Sunday. Twenty-three people have died. The rise in heatstroke cases reflects the smothering heat wave, with temperatures of 35 degrees or higher observed in many places for the four days from July 16, agency officials said. In Tatebayashi, Gunma Prefecture, the mercury shot up to 37.6 on July 16 and to 39.2 the following day, according to the Meteorological Agency.
Abnormal Heat, Strong Winds Feed Siberian Forest Fire
Abnormal heat and strong winds have firefighters working overtime in Tomsk, Siberia this week where they are still battling blazes that have now spread over 15,000 hectares of Russian forests.
Thick smog from the fire has forced the local airport to close, delaying travelers with flight cancellations.
Firefighters are using helicopters to dump water on the fire because this summer broke 170 year old records for heat and dryness.
With temperatures over 90 degrees and without any precipitation in the forecast the job won’t be getting any easier for those firefighters.
BILLINGS – Mandatory evacuations were ordered Thursday for residents of 20 to 30 houses in south-central Montana after a 5-square-mile wildfire surged toward a rural subdivision.
The order from Stillwater County commissioners covered the Hermit Creek subdivision and a five-mile stretch of Shane Creek Road south of Columbus.
Firefighters made some progress Thursday on the back end of the Skibstad, reporting that it was 35 percent contained by late afternoon. But on the fire’s leading edge, a steady breeze was pushing the blaze toward houses.
“That north and northeast portion up by the homes is a lot of concern,” said Paula Short with the state Department of Natural Resources and Conservation.
A shelter for evacuees was set up at Columbus High School.
As flames approached within a couple miles of his property on Shane Creek Road, Shane Fouhy said he was packing some belongings, setting out sprinklers to water down his house and yard and heading into Columbus to stay with relatives.
“I’ve been out all morning watering and the wind is kind of whirling,” he said. “It’s burning in all directions.”
Some structures were confirmed burned; how many and whether any were houses remained unclear. No injuries have been reported.
Residents of dozens more houses were put on notice that they, too, might have to go. State officials say there are 124 homes in the area.
Barb Marshall, who lives on Shane Creek Road several miles outside the area under mandatory evacuation, was keeping a close eye on the smoke plumes billowing up to the south.
“I’ve got my rig loaded and I’m ready to go,” she said.
The fire started Wednesday evening in a secondary building on Skibstad Road and quickly spread across the surrounding landscape. Pushed south by the wind through timber, grass and sage brush, it reached into areas of Carbon County.
Prior to the mandatory order, county workers and firefighters went door to door asking people to leave voluntarily.
A heavy air tanker and several smaller aircraft were providing support to at least 60 firefighters with more personnel en route, Short said.
A federal incident management team was to take over the battle against the fire.
Elsewhere in Montana, the Wolf Creek fire north of Winnett grew to more than 9 square miles but was 70 percent contained Thursday afternoon, The Great Falls Tribune reported. The lightning-caused fire had threatened five houses and 10 outbuildings.
The nearby 15 Mile fire that began Wednesday had burned 1,350 acres, the paper reported. No structures were threatened.
In western Montana, the 5-square-mile Mission Road fire was reported to be 80 percent contained.
Near Lincoln, officials said a three-story lodge destroyed in a 43-acre fire that started Tuesday in the Roger’s Pass area was worth an estimated $3 million, according to the Helena Independent Record. The cause of that blaze, known as Joe’s Mountain fire, was under investigation.
Gov. Brian Schweitzer Thursday asked President Barack Obama to declare a disaster area for parts of southeast Montana with damage from the Ash Creek Fire.
If the request is granted it could make federal aid available to restore public infrastructure damaged by the fire, which burned 390 square miles in Powder River and Rosebud counties and on the Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation.
Public damages in those areas is estimated at $1.6 million. Most of that was to Tongue River Electric Co-op infrastructure. Schweitzer says he also has requested the Small Business Administration complete a damage assessment.
More than 925 wildfires have burned a combined 732 square miles across Montana so far in 2012. That’s well above the 530-square-mile annual average over the past decade.
About two-thirds of this year’s fires have been human caused. However, fires caused by lightning account for the bulk of the acreage burned.
Flights Canceled, Power Disrupted As Storms Wreak Havoc In US Northeast (PHOTOS)
Storms hit the U.S. Northeast Thursday, leaving at least one person dead and knocking out power to hundreds of thousands of residents.
About 900 flights have been canceled due to bad weather. New York’s LaGuardia Airport reported the maximum number of cancellations, with 162 flights grounded while many flights were delayed at airports in Chicago, Philadelphia, Washington, DC, Baltimore and Boston, the Federal Aviation Administration said.
Severe thunderstorms accompanied by heavy downpour are expected to hit the Midwest, New York City and the Northeast Friday, forecasters have said.
The National Weather Service issued thunderstorm warnings in Delaware, Maryland, New Jersey, Kentucky, Virginia, Arkansas and several other points that lie in between.
In Pennsylvania, a woman died in her car, which was crushed under a tree, according to CNN.
“The risk for widespread damaging winds will increase from midday to mid-afternoon from Indiana and Ohio across Pennsylvania, southeast New York, into western Massachusetts and Connecticut,” the U.S. Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Okla., said.
The weather service has warned of possible tornadoes ripping through Elmira, N.Y., and Brookville, Pa.
DAY28: America’s infrastructure takes another hit from 2nd apocalyptic ‘derecho’ superstorm
The ‘Great Derecho’ Exposed Old Grids
By MoneyShow.com Jul 24, 2012 3:30 pm
The power is back up (for the most part) after the storm that swept down on the mid-Atlantic states in early July. Now utilities are going to have to calculate what it cost them.
The Great Derecho of 2012 knocked out power to 4.3 million people over 10 Midwest and Middle Atlantic states. The toll in human lives and property damage has yet to be fully counted.
Hurricanes typically take days to form at sea. That gives first responders, utilities and government agencies in threatened areas time to prepare for damage control. In contrast, the Great Derecho came with hurricane-force winds virtually without warning. Recovery plans had to be made on the fly, in some cases with emergency communications networks out of service.
The longer the outage, the greater the cost incurred by utilities. The storm’s intensity is a clear warning we’ve entered a period of greater extremes, with increased stresses on basic systems, particularly electricity.
Weather Extremes Leave Parts of U.S. Grid Buckling
Travis Long/The News & Observer, via Associated Press
By MATTHEW L. WALD and JOHN SCHWARTZ
Published: July 25, 2012
Some utilities are re-examining long-held views on the economics of protecting against the weather. Pepco, the utility serving the area around Washington, has repeatedly studied the idea of burying more power lines, and the company and its regulators have always decided that the cost outweighed the benefit. But the company has had five storms in the last two and a half years for which recovery took at least five days, and after the derecho last month, the consensus has changed. Both the District of Columbia and Montgomery County, Md., have held hearings to discuss the option — though in the District alone, the cost would be $1.1 billion to $5.8 billion, depending on how many of the power lines were put underground.
Even without storms, heat waves are changing the pattern of electricity use, raising peak demand higher than ever. That implies the need for new investment in generating stations, transmission lines and local distribution lines that will be used at full capacity for only a few hundred hours a year. “We build the system for the 10 percent of the time we need it,” said Mark Gabriel, a senior vice president of Black & Veatch, an engineering firm. And that 10 percent is “getting more extreme.”
Even as the effects of weather extremes become more evident, precisely how to react is still largely an open question, said David Behar, the climate program director for the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission. “We’re living in an era of assessment, not yet in an area of adaptation,” he said.
He says that violent storms and forest fires can be expected to affect water quality and water use: runoff from major storms and falling ash could temporarily shut down reservoirs. Deciding how to address such issues is the work of groups like the Water Utility Climate Alliance, of which he is a member. “In some ways, the science is still catching up with the need of water managers for high-quality projection,” he said.
Some needs are already known. San Francisco will spend as much as $40 million to modify discharge pipes for treated wastewater to prevent bay water from flowing back into the system.
Melting ice in Greenland has swelled the island’s rivers with water. A NASA satellite snapped a photo of meltwater overflowing the banks of the Watson River near Kangerlussuaq, a key air transportation hub, on July 12. Two weeks later, however, river levels have receded somewhat, according to a release from the NASA Earth Observatory. “Water rises every year, but I’ve never before observed it at this level of discharge,” said Richard Forster, a University of Utah researcher who has done extensive fieldwork in Greenland, in a statement. “It was also about two weeks prior to the normal seasonal peak.” The town, known as Kanger, hosts one of the island’s busiest commercial airports and is a frequent departure point for scientific research flights. It lies about 74 miles (125 kilometers) from the sea. The water most likely came from melting of the ice sheet – rather than an ice-dammed lake bursting or glacial lake drainage – as the high discharge was maintained for so long, Forster said. The flooding follows reports that 97 percent of Greenland’s ice sheets thawed on the surface, according to satellite measurements. Only four days before, just 40 percent of the surface ice layer was thawing.This year’s ice melt is well above average: About half of Greenland’s surface ice tends to melt every summer, with the meltwater at higher elevations quickly refreezing in place and the coastal meltwater either pooling on top of the ice or draining into the sea. The massive melt may have been caused by a ridge or dome of warm air hovering over Greenland. Signs of ice melt were even found around Summit Station in central Greenland, which at 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) above sea level is near to the highest point on the ice sheet. The melting characteristics of such a huge ice sheet – spanning 656,000 square miles (1.7 million square kilometers) – is important for various reasons, particularly its potential effect on sea levels. If melted completely, the Greenland ice sheet could contribute 23 feet (7 meters) to global sea-level rise, according to a 2007 report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the international body charged with assessing climate change. Whether or not this recent massive melt will affect the overall ice loss this summer, and as such bump up sea level, is still an open question. In other Greenland-melting news, a massive iceberg that recently broke away from one of Greenland’s largest glaciers is making its way downstream and toward the open ocean, as shown by a new satellite photo. The drifting island of ice split from the Petermann Glacier’s ice shelf – the front end of a glacier, which hangs off the land and floats on the ocean. Thenewly birthed berg is estimated to be about 46 square miles (120 square kilometers), and finally broke away from the floating tongue of ice on Monday, July 16.
Numerous people have reported contracting an unknown illness after visiting the Wild Africa Trek at Walt Disney World’s Animal Kingdom. According to the Orange County, FL Health Department, hundreds of people have been questioned in connection to flu-like symptoms which were first detected in June. People reported experiencing diarrhea, nausea, fatigue and abdominal pain after taking the site’s three-hour tour, which includes hikes, animal sightings and a foot bridge crossing. “The thing we’re trying to get everyone to understand is this is some kind of stomach bug,” said Health Department spokesman Dain Weister. No specific pathogen has been identified. One guest who became ill posted his experience on the DIS boards. He said he became ill within 24 hours and went to the emergency room. Inspectors were sent to Animal Kingdom to examine its food preparation areas. “Two of those inspections showed no problems, no health violations,” Weister said. “The inspection was satisfactory.” Disney officials stated that increased measures have been taken to promote hand-washing and hand sanitizer use. “We are working closely with the Orange County Health Department to review the situation,” said Disney spokeswoman Andrea Finger. No other areas of Disney World have been affected.
Biohazard name:
Unidentified illness
Biohazard level:
3/4 Hight
Biohazard desc.:
Bacteria and viruses that can cause severe to fatal disease in humans, but for which vaccines or other treatments exist, such as anthrax, West Nile virus, Venezuelan equine encephalitis, SARS virus, variola virus (smallpox), tuberculosis, typhus, Rift Valley fever, Rocky Mountain spotted fever, yellow fever, and malaria. Among parasites Plasmodium falciparum, which causes Malaria, and Trypanosoma cruzi, which causes trypanosomiasis, also come under this level.
Symptoms:
flu-like symptoms
Status:
confirmed
Today
Epidemic Hazard
Zimbabwe
Multiple areas, [Harare (Capital City) and Chitungwiza]
More than 100 people in the Zimbabwean capital Harare and Chitungwiza, a dormitory town 35km southeast of the city, have contracted typhoid this month, and the dilapidated water and sanitation systems are again being blamed for another round of water-borne diseases. According to health officials cited in the local media, 83 cases of typhoid have been confirmed in Chitungwiza and a further 28 in Harare, of which 25 were linked to a supermarket in the Avenues area of the city centre. Portia Manangazira, the chief disease control officer in the Health Ministry, told IRIN that in June 22 cases of suspected cholera, 10 of which were confirmed, were reported in Chiredzi – a town in Masvingo Province close to neighbouring South Africa – and one confirmed case of cholera was reported in Manicaland Province, which borders Mozambique. “We are monitoring the situation very closely to make sure the cholera does not spread. The health sector is on high alert,” she said. A year-long outbreak of cholera in 2008 killed more than 4,000 people and infected about 100,000 others and since then there have been regular outbreaks of waterborne diseases in both urban and rural areas. In January 2012 about 900 Harare residents were diagnosed with typhoid, but no fatalities were recorded.
Biohazard name:
Cholera Outbreak
Biohazard level:
2/4 Medium
Biohazard desc.:
Bacteria and viruses that cause only mild disease to humans, or are difficult to contract via aerosol in a lab setting, such as hepatitis A, B, and C, influenza A, Lyme disease, salmonella, mumps, measles, scrapie, dengue fever, and HIV. “Routine diagnostic work with clinical specimens can be done safely at Biosafety Level 2, using Biosafety Level 2 practices and procedures. Research work (including co-cultivation, virus replication studies, or manipulations involving concentrated virus) can be done in a BSL-2 (P2) facility, using BSL-3 practices and procedures. Virus production activities, including virus concentrations, require a BSL-3 (P3) facility and use of BSL-3 practices and procedures”, see Recommended Biosafety Levels for Infectious Agents.
Extreme weather: Get ready to see more of it, scientists say
By Moni Basu, CNN
Fatima Domingpe applies sunscreen to her face near the Mosaic Fountain in downtown Silver Spring, Maryland, on Saturday, July 7. A record heat wave has been in the area for more than a week.
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
The United States experienced its warmest 12 months on record
A new report Tuesday says 2011 will be remembered as the year of extreme weather
One scientist says climate change increases the chances of more such weather
There’s debate over how climate change affects weather patterns
(CNN) — A map of significant climate events for the United States in June looks almost apocalyptic: hellish heat, ferocious fires and severe storms leaving people injured, homeless and even dead.
That followed a warm winter and early season droughts. News came Monday that the mainland United States experienced its warmest 12 months since the dawn of record-keeping in 1895.
And on Tuesday, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) released a report calling 2011 a year of extreme weather.
Remember Hurricane Irene? Or the floods in Thailand and southern China and the deadly drought in the Horn of Africa? Heavy rains in Brazil caused massive landslides and much of Europe suffered through a sweltering heatwave.
It’s tempting to simplify things and blame it all on global warming.
After all, nine of the top 10 warmest years globally have occurred since 2000, according to NOAA.
But weather can be complicated.
The real challenge is figuring out whether a particular storm or flood was due to climate change or natural variables, said Chris Field, founding director of the Carnegie Institution’s Department of Global Ecology.
The NOAA report, for instance, noted some events that were exacerbated by other factors. However, climate change increases global risks, Field said.
“As we change the climate, we’re shifting the odds for extreme weather,” he said.
It’s sort of like upping your chances of a car accident if you’re speeding.
The four classes of extremes — high heat, heavy precipitation and floods, duration and intensity of droughts and extremes related to higher sea levels — have changed in the last 50 years, Field said.
“Increasingly, we are loading the dice towards these very damaging kinds of extremes,” he said.
But that’s not to say every weather event is related to warming temperatures.
Southern Greenland, northern Russia, and the eastern two-thirds of North America have felt the greatest warmth in 2012, but many places — Alaska, Mongolia and most of Australia — have been cool anomalies.
The men’s final at the Wimbledon tennis tournament Sunday was stopped briefly for rain. Rain, in Britain? Although it has a reputation for sogginess, it’s been cooler and wetter than normal for the last few months in the British isles.
America’s northwest has also escaped the heat. The state of Washington just marked its seventh coolest June ever.
“When you’ve got a planet that’s nearest warmest levels on record, that doesn’t mean every part of the world is going to be the warmest ever,” said Jeff Masters, director of meteorology for Weather Underground.
“The U.S. has been unlucky enough to be in that sort of pattern,” he said.
Jake Crouch, a climate scientist at the National Climatic Data Center, said weather patterns — including the jet stream or the ocean-atmosphere systems in the Pacific known as El Niño and La Niña — have a great effect on weather.
In 2011, two back-to-back La Niñas, each characterized by cooler-than-average water temperatures in the eastern Pacific, affected significant weather events — including droughts in the southern United States and northern Mexico and in east Africa.
There is debate over how climate change affects such weather patterns but the NOAA-led “state of the climate” report said La Niña-related heat waves are now 20 times more likely to occur than 50 years ago.
Scientists also analyzed the United Kingdom’s very warm November 2011 and a very cold December 2010. They said that cold Decembers are now half as likely to occur versus 50 years ago, whereas warm Novembers are now 62 times more likely.
The report pointed out that some weather events, like the Thailand flooding, are influenced by humans in other ways.
“Although the flooding was unprecedented, the amount of rain that fell in the river ‘catchment’ area was not very unusual,” the report said. “Other factors, such as changes in reservoir policies and increased construction on the flood plain, were found most relevant in setting the scale of the disaster.”
The 2012 hurricane season has gotten off to a robust start, though meteorologist Thomas Downs of Expert Weather Investigations attributed that to a cyclical warming of Atlantic waters.
“We’ve had a tremendous start to the system. We are in the middle of a warm phase,” he said.
Hurricane Andrew in 1992 was devastating, but it was also the first named storm of that year — in August.
By contrast, this year, the United States has already lived through four named storms — two in May and two in June. The last was Tropical Storm Debby, which flooded Florida.
The warmer waters can lead to warmer temperatures on land, Downs said. So can extended drought.
“The biggest thing of this year is the cumulative effect of the last two seasons. Some parts of the United States have been under drought conditions for the past two years,” he said, and did not have much rain in April and May. Less solar energy is absorbed by hot, parched land.
“The reality is when you do have extreme weather, it is highlighted,” Downs said. “People want to attribute it to one factor or another.”
The other reality is that Americans and others will likely be paying a lot more for cereal, sweeteners and meat as the price of corn goes up because of failed crops.
“The crops are hurting,” said Chad Hart, a grain market specialist at Iowa State University.
The eastern part of the Corn Belt is especially hard-hit. In states like Iowa, farmers are in the critical stage of corn pollination.
“We need a good inch of moisture this week,” Hart said. “And there’s no rain in the forecast.
“That means we are looking for a much lower yield for crops we produce in the Midwest.”
Public Health officials announced Friday that a rabbit tested positive for an illness that “is similar to plague” in Pueblo. The rabbit was found in Pueblo West in the 1000 Block of West Saginaw Drive, and tested positive for Tularemia. Though the bacterial illness occurs naturally in the U.S., it’s a condition that can be fatal to humans. “Tularemia is similar to plague,” Heather Maio, director of the Environmental Health Division at the Pueblo City-County Health department, said. “It can be passed to humans or animals through the bite of infected insects – most commonly ticks and deer flies – and by handling infected, sick, or dead animals.” The disease can also be passed to people or animals if they eat meat or drink water infected by the bacteria. It cannot, however, be passed from person to person. Tularemia symptoms typically occur within 3-5 days after exposure and include sudden fever, headaches, diarrhea, muscle aches, dry cough and progressive weakness. The disease is fatal, Public Health officials said, if not treated with the right antibiotics. Ticks in the area may pose the biggest threat to humans, so Public Health officials are advising locals and their pets to steer clear of heavily wooded areas where ticks thrive.
Biohazard name:
Tularemia (rabbit)
Biohazard level:
3/4 Hight
Biohazard desc.:
Bacteria and viruses that can cause severe to fatal disease in humans, but for which vaccines or other treatments exist, such as anthrax, West Nile virus, Venezuelan equine encephalitis, SARS virus, variola virus (smallpox), tuberculosis, typhus, Rift Valley fever, Rocky Mountain spotted fever, yellow fever, and malaria. Among parasites Plasmodium falciparum, which causes Malaria, and Trypanosoma cruzi, which causes trypanosomiasis, also come under this level.
Chinese state media say a toxic gas leak caused by chemicals used nine years ago to combat the SARS epidemic has forced more than 800 workers to evacuate from a downtown office building in east China’s Hangzhou city. The gas came from a stockpile of chlorine dioxide powder. It was used as a disinfectant in 2003 during the SARS scare but was never disposed of. White smog filled the 19th floor of the building on Friday morning, causing panic.
At least eight children were killed and 18 injured when the roof of a private school collapsed in Bijnor district of Uttar Pradesh on Friday afternoon. At least 30 children were in the classroom when the slab of the verandah on the first floor collapsed. District magistrate of Bijnor Sarika Mohan, however, said only six children have died in the accident and seven others sustained serious injuries .The injured have been admitted to the district hospital. Ramanand Public High School, a privately owned school, is located in the Zameerpur village, Chandpur town, Bijnor. The roof of the class room collapsed when about 30 students were in class. The children were all in Class V, aged between 10 and 13 years. “Prima facie it’s a case of negligence by the owner of the school. I have ordered a detailed inquiry into the incident and a FIR is being lodged against the owner of the school Rishipal Singh,” said Mohan. “Five children were declared brought dead by doctors and 18 kids have been admitted to various hospitals. Some of the injured are in serious condition. The rescue work is still in progress and we hope that there is no one left in the debris,” Mohan told media persons. The management and staff of the school fled after the incident and police teams have been deployed to search for them, she added. “I have also ordered an inquiry in to incident,” she added. Locals and villagers started the rescue operation, and by the time help reached, they had already rescued about a dozen kids. They were rushed to nearby nursing homes and primary health centres for treatment. The villagers also alleged that help reached them several hours after the incident took place and by that time they had rescued most of the children trapped inside. The parents and locals also shouted slogans and gheraoed senior officials of the district administration. They were pacified after the administration promised compensation and strict action against those found guilty of negligence. The district magistrate said a proposal for the compensation will be sent to the government.
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Minister of Local Government and Community Development Dato Sri Wong Soon Koh yesterday confirmed that there is a cholera outbreak in Bintulu. Speaking to reporters after a briefing by officers from the state Health Department at his office here yesterday, he said the department detected the outbreak on July 14 after a case was confirmed positive with Vibrio Cholerae. “Since July 14, the state Health Department declared there is an outbreak detected in Bintulu. Since then, the state Health Department initiated its investigation to trace all the suspected symptomatic cases. Anyone coming down with diarrhoea and vomiting will be investigated to check whether it is cholera or not,” he added. Based on investigation by the department, the outbreak was believed to have started when three groups of regatta participants from Rumah Gawan, Kampung Jepak and Kampung Hilir in Sebauh, Bintulu used water from Kemena River to wash plates, fish and their hands. “The bacteria from the river had contaminated the food and the hands of the people during the regatta and then continuously spread from person to person and contaminated food and drinks. Now the state Health Department is also suspecting that it is spread from Ramadan Bazaar due to contaminated food and drinks,” he added. He noted that as of yesterday, the department had received 140 cases – 33 positive for cholera, 55 negative and 52 cases still pending result. The youngest patient was one year 11 months old while the oldest was 84 years old. The department also detected nine cases with Vibrio Cholerae but without any symptom. As of yesterday, 177 people had been screened for signs and symptoms of acute gastroenteritis and were given doxycycline, an antibiotic.On the outbreak, Wong said it was still spreading in Bintulu with 11 localities declared positive for cholera; Rumah Panjang Gawan at Sungai Sebauh, Kampung Jepak, Kampung Sebauh Hilir in Sebauh, Rumah Usah in Sungai Segan, Setinggan Mozako, Kampung Assyikirin, Kampung Sinong in Jalan Masjid, Setinggan Hock Peng Tanjung Kidurong, Batu 10, Jalan Bintulu/Miri, Kampung Baru and Kirana Palm Oil/Brightwood Quarters, Kemena Industrial Estate. “The state Health Department will continue to take all samples from Sungai Kemena and its tributaries as well as food sampling from Ramadan Bazaar and houses. Besides that, the state Health Department will intensify diarrhoea and vomiting surveillance in all health facilities in Bintulu and issue cholera alert to all government, private health facilities in the state whereby when there is increase in number of admission, the state Health Department will investigate whether it is cholera or not,” he said. Wong said attention would also be given to all food handlers in the Ramadan Bazaar in Bintulu to ensure that they meet the department’s health standards, which also requires them to go for cholera screening. “Once they are cleared from the disease, they will be issued health cards and they must bring the health cards with them when they operate the stalls. If they refuse to go for screening, they will be asked to close down their stalls,” he added. For the convenience of the public, a screening centre is opened at the old Bintulu health clinic from 8am to 10pm every day. The department is also using Bintulu Hospital for isolation of severe cases while mild cases and asymptomatic cases would be treated at the national service camp in Samalaju in Bintulu. Wong appealed to the public to give their fullest cooperation to the department to ensure that the outbreak could be contained.
Biohazard name:
Vibrio Cholera Outbreak
Biohazard level:
2/4 Medium
Biohazard desc.:
Bacteria and viruses that cause only mild disease to humans, or are difficult to contract via aerosol in a lab setting, such as hepatitis A, B, and C, influenza A, Lyme disease, salmonella, mumps, measles, scrapie, dengue fever, and HIV. “Routine diagnostic work with clinical specimens can be done safely at Biosafety Level 2, using Biosafety Level 2 practices and procedures. Research work (including co-cultivation, virus replication studies, or manipulations involving concentrated virus) can be done in a BSL-2 (P2) facility, using BSL-3 practices and procedures. Virus production activities, including virus concentrations, require a BSL-3 (P3) facility and use of BSL-3 practices and procedures”, see Recommended Biosafety Levels for Infectious Agents.
Sixteen people are reported dead in Uganda from a mystery illness. The Uganda publication UG Pulse reports that a strange illness, cause unknown, is spreading in the Kibaale district in western Uganda. The District Health Officer, Dr. Dan Kyamanwa, stated that 11 of the deaths were from the same family in the Nyamarunda Sub County. A twelfth death was a health officer. There are also reports of the illness appearing in the clinical officer who treated the family from Nyamarunda and a driver who transported the deceased. Kyamanwa says that symptoms of the illness include high fever, vomiting, diarrhea and systems failure. Death occurs within four to seven days.The Ugandan government is reportedly sending a team of experts to investigate the outbreak.
Biohazard name:
Unidentified fatal disease
Biohazard level:
4/4 Hazardous
Biohazard desc.:
Viruses and bacteria that cause severe to fatal disease in humans, and for which vaccines or other treatments are not available, such as Bolivian and Argentine hemorrhagic fevers, H5N1(bird flu), Dengue hemorrhagic fever, Marburg virus, Ebola virus, hantaviruses, Lassa fever, Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever, and other hemorrhagic or unidentified diseases. When dealing with biological hazards at this level the use of a Hazmat suit and a self-contained oxygen supply is mandatory. The entrance and exit of a Level Four biolab will contain multiple showers, a vacuum room, an ultraviolet light room, autonomous detection system, and other safety precautions designed to destroy all traces of the biohazard. Multiple airlocks are employed and are electronically secured to prevent both doors opening at the same time. All air and water service going to and coming from a Biosafety Level 4 (P4) lab will undergo similar decontamination procedures to eliminate the possibility of an accidental release.
Tsunami Information Bulletin in Off W Coast Of Northern Sumatra, Indian Ocean
000
WEIO23 PHEB 250034
TIBIOX
TSUNAMI BULLETIN NUMBER 001
PACIFIC TSUNAMI WARNING CENTER/NOAA/NWS
ISSUED AT 0034Z 25 JUL 2012
THIS BULLETIN IS FOR ALL AREAS OF THE INDIAN OCEAN.
... TSUNAMI INFORMATION BULLETIN ...
THIS MESSAGE IS FOR INFORMATION ONLY.
THIS BULLETIN IS ISSUED AS ADVICE TO GOVERNMENT AGENCIES. ONLY
NATIONAL AND LOCAL GOVERNMENT AGENCIES HAVE THE AUTHORITY TO MAKE
DECISIONS REGARDING THE OFFICIAL STATE OF ALERT IN THEIR AREA AND
ANY ACTIONS TO BE TAKEN IN RESPONSE.
AN EARTHQUAKE HAS OCCURRED WITH THESE PRELIMINARY PARAMETERS
ORIGIN TIME - 0028Z 25 JUL 2012
COORDINATES - 2.5 NORTH 95.8 EAST
LOCATION - OFF W COAST OF NORTHERN SUMATRA
MAGNITUDE - 6.6
EVALUATION
A DESTRUCTIVE WIDESPREAD TSUNAMI THREAT DOES NOT EXIST BASED ON
HISTORICAL EARTHQUAKE AND TSUNAMI DATA.
HOWEVER - THERE IS A VERY SMALL POSSIBILITY OF A LOCAL TSUNAMI
THAT COULD AFFECT COASTS LOCATED USUALLY NO MORE THAN A HUNDRED
KILOMETERS FROM THE EARTHQUAKE EPICENTER. AUTHORITIES IN THE
REGION NEAR THE EPICENTER SHOULD BE MADE AWARE OF THIS
POSSIBILITY.
THIS WILL BE THE ONLY BULLETIN ISSUED BY THE PACIFIC TSUNAMI
WARNING CENTER FOR THIS EVENT UNLESS ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
BECOMES AVAILABLE.
THE JAPAN METEOROLOGICAL AGENCY MAY ISSUE ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
FOR THIS EVENT. IN THE CASE OF CONFLICTING INFORMATION...THE
MORE CONSERVATIVE INFORMATION SHOULD BE USED FOR SAFETY.
(Reuters) – A strong earthquake with a magnitude of 6.6 struck off northern Sumatra in Indonesia on Wednesday, the U.S. Geological Survey said, but authorities said there was little chance of a tsunami.
The quake was felt by residents on the island of Simeulue off Sumatra’s northwest coast but there were no immediate reports of damage or injuries.
“The quake has no tsunami potential,” said Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, a spokesman for the National Disaster Mitigation Agency. “Some people ran away from their houses. We don’t have any house damage.”
The Hawaii-based Pacific Tsunami Warning Center said there was no threat of a widespread, destructive tsunami after the quake, about 330 km (205 miles) southeast of Indonesia’s Banda Aceh. It said there was a “very small possibility” of a local tsunami. (Reporting by Olivia Rondonuwu; Writing by Paul Tait; Editing by Michael Perry)
Tongariro volcano is showing signs of a possible awakening. On 13 July 2012, an increase in small (<M2.5) earthquakes was detected. The quakes were clustered at depths of 2-7 km under the area between Emerald crater and Te Mari crater. More than 20 earthquakes were recorded until 20 July, when the seismic activity peaked and prompted GeoNet to raise the alert level from 0 to 1. Compared to a background average of 2 quakes per year, the swarm is significant and could indicate magma movements. Seismic activity dropped on 21 July with only 1 quake since then, but preliminary measurements show an increase in volcanic gas emission. NZ Scientist started to increase their monitoring at the volcano.
By Spyros KouvoussisThe new seismic-detecting mechanism that observes the activity of the volcano in Santorini, Caldera, was finally placed at the bottom of the sea. The scientific community now says it will be ready to warn authorities in case there is any alarming activity. The new mechanism is the cutting edge of technology of its kind.
The procedure to place the mechanism at the bottom of the sea took ten days and the team of scientists of the project hailed from Greece, France and Spain. The mechanism is placed in the north part of Caldera, where the deepest spot is 389m. The mechanism was set up with the use of two special ships owned by the Greek Center of Sea Research. The mechanism is equipped with instruments that can assess the structure of the bottom of the sea and measure its temperature. That way scientists can have a better look at the volcano’s activity.
Dimitris Sakellariou, the head of the program, said that the first signs show that the volcano has very limited activity. He also pointed out that although the program should have started a long time ago, there is a high risk that due to the economic crisis its survival will be an issue.
The number of people taken to hospitals by ambulance due to heatstroke in the week through Sunday more than doubled from the preceding week to 5,467, preliminary data showed Tuesday. The figure, up from 2,622 in the week to July 15, hit the highest for a single week this summer, according to the data released by the Fire and Disaster Management Agency. Deaths caused by heatstroke increased to 13 from five in the preceding week. Tokyo and Saitama Prefecture had the most victims, with ambulances called for 388 people each. They were followed by 382 in Aichi Prefecture and 372 in Osaka Prefecture. People aged 65 or older accounted for 45.9 percent of the total. Since the agency started this year’s survey on May 28, 11,116 people were taken to hospitals as of Sunday. Twenty-three people have died. The rise in heatstroke cases reflects the smothering heat wave, with temperatures of 35 degrees or higher observed in many places for the four days from July 16, agency officials said. In Tatebayashi, Gunma Prefecture, the mercury shot up to 37.6 on July 16 and to 39.2 the following day, according to the Meteorological Agency.
Weather authorities issued heat wave advisories nationwide on Tuesday in response to a heat wave that has been gripping South Korea, with the capital city experiencing its second straight “tropical night” this week. The so-called tropical night phenomenon is defined by nighttime lows staying above 25 C, with nighttime being from 6 p.m. to 9 a.m. It often happens when monsoon season ends, which falls in July in general for the country. Overnight lows across the nation soared well above the threshold on Monday, with the eastern coastal city of Gangneung recording the highest temperature at 28.7 C followed by the southern city of Pohang at 27.1 C. The temperature overnight in Seoul also reached 25.8 C to mark its second consecutive tropical night, according to the Korea Meteorological Administration. The scorching heat led the weather authorities to issue the country’s first heat wave warnings in the southeastern city of Daegu and its surrounding areas in North Gyeongsang Province, set to take effect from 11 a.m. The daytime highs in the region are forecast to soar above 35 C, according to the KMA. The agency also extended the heat wave advisories from the southern regions to the central part of the country including Seoul and the surrounding Gyeonggi areas starting at 11 a.m., with the daytime high in Seoul being expected to climb to 32 C. Heat wave advisories are issued when the mercury goes over 33 C for at least two days, and heat wave warnings are issued when it soars up to 35 C for at least two consecutive days. The heat wave on the Korean Peninsula is forecast to be unabated until at least the end of July due to the influence of a hot and humid North Pacific high temperature system, the weather agency said.
The City of Beloit endured trees blocking roads, fires and thousands of people without power after a series of storms rocked their city on Tuesday morning. “We had a lot of trees down, wires down. We had about 7,000 people without power,” Beloit Fire Chief Brad Liggett told Newsradio 620 WTMJ’s Jon Byman. “We at one time had about 35 calls for response for wires down and trees on fire, trees across the roadway, patients that require oxygen who were without power.” Roads were closed, especially in residential neighborhoods on the west side. Chief Liggett explained that he was hoping for roads closed by fallen trees to be re-opened within 24 hours after crews saw the trunks up to remove them. “It’s a pretty severe storm. The last time I remember a storm like this was in August of 2003,” said Liggett. Alliant Energy said about 12,000 customers had lost power due to the storms in that area.
About 50 residents have been evacuated due to a brush fire in central Ontario’s cottage country. Muskoka Lakes Mayor Alice Murphy says four township fire stations have responded to the blaze on Huckleberry Rock in Milford Bay. The Ministry of Natural Resources is assisting with a water bomber. Murphy says there’s no information yet on the cause of the brush fire, and motorists are being turned away from entering Milford Bay. Murphy says those with no need to travel Highway 118 west in the Milford Bay area should stay away. The response is being co-ordinated by the Muskoka Lakes fire department, the provincial police and the natural resources ministry.
24.07.2012
Forest / Wild Fire
Canada
Province of Manitoba, [Red Sucker Lake First Nation, Wasagamack First Nation, St. Theresa Point First Nation and Garden Hill First Nation]
More than 800 people from four northern Manitoba First Nations have been flown to Winnipeg and Brandon due to forest fires near their home communities. Officials said people deemed the most vulnerable, such as those with asthma and other breathing conditions, were flown out first, while others may follow if the fire situation gets worse. “We didn’t have anybody who was acutely distressed from smoke inhalation but we did have folks with runny eyes, coughing, sore throats, which is a normal effect from being involved with the forest fires,” said Janice Lowe from the Brandon Regional Health Authority. The Manitoba Association of Native Firefighters is looking after the evacuations and asked both Brandon and Winnipeg to host the evacuees, due to the large number. “This is the largest evacuation that we’ve handled in recent times,” said Brian Kayes from the City of Brandon. On Monday, the province said 77 forest fires are burning in Manitoba. As of July 20, more than 360 firefighters were battling the blazes, with 12 water bombers and 31 helicopters being used. Fires are currently burning in northeastern and western, central and eastern parts of Manitoba, said officials. The largest numbers of fires are currently burning in the northeastern part of Manitoba. Officials from the Manitoba Association of Native Firefighters said people had to leave Red Sucker Lake First Nation, Wasagamack First Nation, St. Theresa Point First Nation and Garden Hill First Nation. They said it’s tough to determine how long people could be out of their homes, due to the unpredictable nature of forest fires. They said, however, people should be prepared to be out of their homes for approximately three to seven days. Community members said homes are not currently at risk of burning. Some evacuees, however, said leaving was still difficult. “Some people don’t want to go because they don’t want to leave their homes,” said Eric Wood from Garden Hill Public Health.
25.07.2012
Forest / Wild Fire
Croatia
Primorsko-Goranska Region, [Near to Selce and Moscenicka Draga]
A firefighter has died and 1,500 tourists have been evacuated after forest fires fanned by strong winds broke out on Croatia’s Adriatic coast. “The situation is very difficult … we are doing everything possible to protect people’s lives and property,” Interior Minister Ranko Ostojic said, as the fires continued to blaze out of control on Monday in the increasingly popular tourist area. “Everything is ready for (further) evacuations,” said the minister, who visited the coastal resort of Selce, close to the northern port of Rijeka, where some 150 firefighters were battling the blaze. A firefighter died while battling another blaze that broke out near Moscenicka Draga on the Istria peninsula, fire service official Slavko Gaus said. That fire was brought under control later in the day. The inferno broke out in the morning in the hinterland of Rijeka, some 180km southwest of Zagreb, and spread towards Selce. Strong winds of more than 100km an hour made tackling the fires very difficult as water-bombing planes could not be used, the authorities said. In Selce some 1,500 tourists from two campsites, mostly Slovenians and Austrians, were evacuated while a number of other tourists left a nearby hotel, officials said. Part of the Adriatic coastal highway was closed, police said. The resort was cut off from electricity and phone lines were down, Nova television reported, showing footage of people in Selce covering their faces with scarves to protect themselves from the thick smoke and ashes. The roofs of several houses also caught fire.
Wildfires have forced the evacuation of dozens of villagers from their homes in Madeira on Thursday, with the Portuguese authorities sending teams from the mainland to help overwhelmed local firefighters. Portugal had suffered from a severe drought this year before being hit by temperatures of up to 40C this week, which has triggered forest blazes on the mainland too. More than 300 firefighters were struggling on Thursday to put out wildfires near Tavira, a popular holiday destination in the Algarve region near the Spanish border. Authorities in Madeira have used planes and helicopters to combat the flames, including an aircraft sent by Spain’s civil defence. Portugal sent a military transport plane with 83 firefighters to Madeira, where the flames briefly threatened the outskirts of Funchal, the archipelago’s capital, on Wednesday night. The Portuguese interior minister, Miguel Macedo, is also in Madeira to co-ordinate the efforts. While Funchal was mostly out of danger on Thursday, television footage from the archipelago’s smaller island of Porto Santo showed houses catching fire and firefighters telling residents of Camacha to abandon the area. “The changing wind is strongly compromising the effort to put out the flames, and we only have five firemen there and one truck,” the local fire brigade chief, Afonso Nobrega, told the Lusa news agency. SIC television showed a local man shouting for help to get three women out of a building whose door was on fire. Enveloped in heavy smoke, local residents sprayed water on the outside of their homes while others fled. There have been no reports of deaths of serious injuries. This year’s drought, coupled with scorching weather, poses a threat that fires will escalate during the hottest period in late July and August.
Authorities issued evacuation orders for villages in southwestern Greece on Wednesday where wildfires, aided by strong winds and soaring temperatures, have ravaged large areas. The blaze, burning mostly pine forest, sent smoke over the city of Patras, a port with some 220,000 inhabitants, where regional authorities have declared an emergency. Nine planes and one helicopter were involved in the firefighting effort at Argyra, some 15 kilometres (9 miles) east of Patras. Apostolos Katsifaras, regional governor for western Greece, said evacuation orders had been issued for villages in the rugged fire stricken area — likely to involve several hundred residents. “The conditions are very tough. We are using everything we have against the fire,” Katsifaras said. The state of emergency allows authorities to use additional resources, including Greece’s military.
25.07.2012
Drought
USA
State of Washington, [Counties of Adams, Benton, Chelan, Douglas, Ferry, Franklin, Garfield, Grant, Jefferson, Kitsap, Kittitas, Klickitat, Okanogan, Pend Oreille, Walla Walla and Yakim]
Gov. Chris Gregoire on Monday proclaimed a state of emergency for 16 Washington counties hit by a series of recent storms. Most of the counties are in the eastern half of the state. One death in northeast Washington’s Ferry County is considered storm-related, the governor said. A series of storms that started July 13 have caused power outages, fuel shortages and road closures that threaten some at-risk populations, Gregoire said. High winds, severe thunderstorms and extreme rainfall have damaged homes, businesses and public buildings. The proclamation directs state agencies to “do everything reasonably possible” to help affected communities recover. After a fierce thunder and rain storm last Friday, Ferry County and the Colville Tribes asked for state assistance. The small community of Keller on the Colville Reservation was pummeled by the storm, with downed trees blocking roads, crushing power lines and damaging houses. KHQ-TV reports the Keller Community Center has been functioning as the town’s hub.
“Everyone comes here. This is the place to be,” said volunteer Corrie Johnson. The community center has been offering meals and shelter to those who need it. Winds in northeast Washington hit 66 mph during Friday’s storm, National Weather Service meteorologist John Livingston told the Spokesman-Review. Forest Service officials in the Republic Ranger District said the storm winds toppled numerous trees, blocking trails and roads. “It was horrendous, chaotic,” Christine Bonney, the Republic Police Department’s administrative assistant, told the newspaper. “There were fields of trees lying flat, like the wind ironed them down.” In the Okanogan County community of Omak in north-central Washington, crews were still cleaning up Monday after rain from Friday’s storm flooded about five blocks of downtown streets. At one point, water was knee-deep in the downtown area, the Wenatchee World reported. Several highways in the county were closed temporarily due to downed trees and rain-caused mudslides, Sheriff Frank Rogers said. Grant County also saw pounding hail and isolated flooding.
Counties included in the proclamation include: Adams, Benton, Chelan, Douglas, Ferry, Franklin, Garfield, Grant, Jefferson, Kitsap, Kittitas, Klickitat, Okanogan, Pend Oreille, Walla Walla and Yakima.
Fifty people were injured and trees ripped from the ground as Typhoon Vicente lashed Hong Kong, packing winds in excess of 140 kilometres per hour. Authorities raised the typhoon warning to the most severe level of 10 for the first time since 1999 just after midnight, as Typhoon Vicente roared to within 100km of Hong Kong but it was eventually downgraded to eight. “In the past few hours, Vicente intensified rapidly into a severe typhoon and moved in a more northerly direction, edging closer to Hong Kong,” the Hong Kong Observatory said in a statement following the 10 warning. More than 200 trees fell and pieces of buildings were seen crashing into downtown streets as commuters made their way home from work on Monday evening. Ferry, bus and train services were suspended or ran at reduced capacity, the port was closed and 15 passenger flights to the regional aviation hub were cancelled. More than 210 flights were delayed. The Hong Kong stock exchange delayed the opening of trading on Tuesday until authorities gave the all-clear that it was safe to go to work.
School classes and hospital outpatient clinics were suspended until further notice. Flooding was reported in two areas. Fifteen people were hospitalised out of 50 who sought medical treatment, officials said. Almost 250 people sought refuge in storm shelters. Local media reported that more than 100 commuters stayed in the Tai Wai underground train station overnight, unable to get home after services were suspended. The 10 warning was downgraded to eight early on Tuesday morning as the storm passed to the west and weakened over the southern Chinese coast, but authorities warned residents to remain vigilant. “Although Vicente is moving gradually away from Hong Kong and started to weaken, gale force winds are still prevailing over parts of the territory with occasional storm force winds offshore and on high ground and frequent heavy squally showers,” the Observatory said. “Members of the public are advised not to relax their precautions.”
Tropical cyclone warning raised to its highest level, grounding flights and disrupting businesses across financial hub.
Storm surges and sea wave warnings have been heightened, with winds of up to 100 kph expected [AFP]
A severe typhoon has hit Hong Kong, disrupting business across the financial hub, with offices and the stock market to remain closed for at least part of the morning after the city raised its highest typhoon warning overnight.
Typhoon Vicente battered Hong Kong with gale-force winds and torrential rain, grounding flights and shutting port operations on Tuesday.
Authorities raised the No. 10 tropical cyclone signal for several hours overnight, making this one of the strongest
typhoons to hit the city in the past decade.
Al Jazeera’s Stephanie Scawen, reporting from Hong Kong, said “heavy rain is coming through” the financial hub, and is expected to last “probably for a few days”.
Highest warning level
Financial markets, schools, businesses and non-essential government services close when a No. 8 signal or above is
hoisted, posing a disruption to business in the capitalist hub and former British colony that returned to Chinese rule in 1997.
By 8am local time (00:00 GMT), the typhoon was veering away from the city and weakening, although the No. 8 signal is expected to remain in force until at least 10am (02:00 GMT), the Hong Kong Observatory said, which would force a closure of the stock market for the morning.
Hong Kong Observatory raised the No. 10 signal early on Tuesday as typhoon Vicente swept closer to Hong Kong [Reuters]
The market will be closed for the day if the No. 8 signal remains in place until noon (04:00 GMT), after it dropped three per cent on Monday.
Separately, China’s National Meteorological Centre issued an orange alert for Typhoon Vicente, the second highest warning level in China’s four-tier typhoon warning system, the official Xinhua news agency reported.
Strengthening gale-force winds overturned trees, churned up huge waves in Hong Kong’s Victoria Harbour and sent debris
flying, injuring some 30 people as Vicente hit the city and the western reaches of China’s Guangdong province.
Fifteen flights were cancelled and more than 200 delayed late on Monday, aviation authorities said, although Hong Kong’s
main carrier Cathay Pacific said it planned to resume some flights.
The Hong Kong Observatory raised the No. 10 signal early on Tuesday as typhoon Vicente swept much closer to Hong Kong than initially thought, making this the first time the highest typhoon signal had been raised since 1999.
More than 30,000 Chinese fishing boats were alerted to return to harbour, with 10,560 fishermen taking shelter ashore
in Guangdong, Chinese state media reported. Storm surges and sea wave warnings were heightened, with winds of up to 100 kph expected.
National Weather Service meteorologist Charlotte Dewey said the storm was moving northwest and was first spotted between Eloy and Tucson.
The haboob covered cities in the metropolitan Phoenix area such as Scottsdale, Gilbert, Mesa, Apache Junction, Santan Valley, Chandler, Casa Grande and downtown Phoenix.
There were no official estimates of its size, but Dewey says spotters estimated it was around 2,000 feet tall. She says there were also reports of 35 mph wind gusts in the area, and a report of a 50 mph gust at Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport.
Above are photos of the event from The Associated Press and our iWitness Weather contributors.
More than 40 workers at a nuclear power station in northern India have been exposed to tritium radiation in two separate leaks in the past five weeks. The first accident occurred on June 23 when 38 people were exposed during maintenance work on a coolant channel at the Rajasthan Atomic Power Station in Rawatbhata, senior plant manager Vinod Kumar said. Two of them received radiation doses equivalent to the annual permissible limit, he said, but all those involved have returned to work. In a second incident last Thursday, another four maintenance workers at the plant were exposed to tritium radiation while they were repairing a faulty seal on a pipe. India is on a nuclear power drive, with a host of plants based on Russian, Japanese, American and French technology under consideration or construction.
The country’s growing economy is currently heavily dependent on coal, getting less than 3% of its energy from its existing atomic plants, and the government hopes to raise the figure to 25% by 2050. But environmental watchdogs have expressed concerns about safety in India, where small-scale industrial accidents due to negligence or poor maintenance are commonplace and regulatory bodies are often under-staffed and under-funded. The director of the Rajasthan power station, C.P. Jamb, confirmed the second accident to AFP but said the radiation was within permissible limits and posed no health threat. “The workers were exposed to radiation from 10 to 25 per cent of the annual limit,” Jamb said. “Such minor leakages keep on happening but they cause no harm.” C.D. Rajput, director of the unit where the leak happened, also said the radiation exposure “was well under the limits and all the workers are working normally”. No explanation was immediately available as to why the first incident at the plant took a month to emerge.
The security situation in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) province of North Kivu has been deteriorating for months because of armed conflict between various renegade soldier groups. The fighting has resulted in the displacement of approximately 250,000 people from the area fleeing the violence in search of safety. Health concerns have also risen in violence-ridden areas of the eastern DRC. According to a World Health Organization (WHO) Global Alert and Response (GAR) issued Monday, the DRC has reported a sharp increase in the number of cholera cases in the armed conflict area of North Kivu. For the three weeks spanning June 11 to July 1, 368 new cases of cholera were reported. Because of the lack of security in the area, there is a concern those stricken with cholera will have difficulty in accessing the health-care facilities and could increase the number of severe and fatal cases. The WHO also reports the fear of the cholera spilling over the borders into neighboring countries Burundi, Rwanda, South Sudan and Uganda. Médecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) and its partners blame the outbreak on a lack of potable drinking water.
Patients are being treated with infusions and antibiotics as appropriate, at treatment centres. Interventions to control the epidemic that are being carried out include education and communication; management of cases; increased surveillance; hygiene and sanitation; and provision of safe drinking water.WHO is working to support national authorities in response to the cholera outbreak and the broader humanitarian emergency resulting from conflict and population displacement. Cholera is an acute bacterial intestinal disease characterized by sudden onset, profuse watery stools (given the appearance as rice water stools because of flecks of mucus in water) due to a very potent enterotoxin. The enterotoxin leads to an extreme loss of fluid and electrolytes in the production of diarrhea. It has been noted that an untreated patient can lose his bodyweight in fluids in hours resulting in shock and death. It is caused by the bacterium, Vibrio cholerae. Serogroups O1 and O139 are the types associated with the epidemiological characteristics of cholera (outbreaks). The bacteria are acquired through ingestion of contaminated water or food through a number of mechanisms. Water is usually contaminated by the feces of infected individuals.
Drinking water can be contaminated at the source, during transport or during storage at home.Food can be contaminated by soiled hands, during preparation or while eating. Beverages and ice prepared with contaminated water and fruits and vegetables washed with this water are other examples. Some outbreaks are linked to raw or undercooked seafood. The incubation for cholera can be from a few hours to 5 days. As long as the stools are positive, the person is infective. Some patients may become carriers of the organism which can last for months. Cholera is diagnosed by growing the bacteria in culture. Treatment consists of replacement of fluids lost, intravenous replacement in severe cases. Doxycycline or tetracycline antibiotic therapy can shorten the course of severe disease. According to Wikipedia, North Kivu is a province bordering Lake Kivu in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. Its capital is Goma. North Kivu borders the provinces of Orientale to the north and northwest, Maniema to the southwest, and South Kivu to the south. To the east, it borders the countries of Uganda and Rwanda.
Biohazard name:
Cholera Outbreak
Biohazard level:
2/4 Medium
Biohazard desc.:
Bacteria and viruses that cause only mild disease to humans, or are difficult to contract via aerosol in a lab setting, such as hepatitis A, B, and C, influenza A, Lyme disease, salmonella, mumps, measles, scrapie, dengue fever, and HIV. “Routine diagnostic work with clinical specimens can be done safely at Biosafety Level 2, using Biosafety Level 2 practices and procedures. Research work (including co-cultivation, virus replication studies, or manipulations involving concentrated virus) can be done in a BSL-2 (P2) facility, using BSL-3 practices and procedures. Virus production activities, including virus concentrations, require a BSL-3 (P3) facility and use of BSL-3 practices and procedures”, see Recommended Biosafety Levels for Infectious Agents.
MessageToEagle.com – TW Hydrae is a star between 5-10 million years old, and only 176 light-years away, in the direction of the constellation of Hydrae (the Water Snake), is in the final stage of formation.
It’s surrounded by a disc of dust and gas that may condense to form a complete set of planets. TW Hydrae has passed out of its infancy but is not yet mature.
Astronomers are trying to understand the processes at work in stars at this stage in their lives because, for example, during this period planets might be developing from disks around the stars.
The nature of the star’s corona, the very hot (over a million degrees centigrade) extended gaseous outer atmosphere, is one such process. TW Hydrae provides a valuable example for two reasons:
It is relatively close by and therefore bright, and it is rotating with its pole pointed nearly directly towards Earth, enabling scientists to view the star’s polar region nearly face on.
Like other young stars of its size and age, TW Hydrae emits strong X-rays and lines of ionized hydrogen. These are thought to result from shocks generated as material flows onto the stellar surface, and from magnetically heated gas in the corona.
Like other young stars of its size and age, TW Hydrae emits strong X-rays and astronomers investigate why, and how might they effect the star’s proto-planetary disk?
TW Hydrae
The star system TW Hydrae, shown here in an artist’s conception, possesses a protoplanetary disk holding vast numbers of pebble-sized rocky chunks. Those pebbles eventually should grow to become full-sized planets. Credit: Bill Saxton (NRAO/AUI/NSF)
Several mechanisms have been proposed, including coronal magnetic field activity similar to that on the sun, accretion onto the stellar surface that might also contribute to winds and flares, and shocks from jets that develop.
Each mechanism has associated with it hot gas with characteristic temperatures and densities.
A schematic diagram of the surface of TW Hydrae, illustrating where strong X-ray emission might arise. Accreting material can produce winds and shocks at the stellar photosphere; some parameters are specified. Credit: N. Brickhouse, et al, 2010
Recently, SAO astronomers Andrea Dupree, Nancy Brickhouse, Steve Cranmer, Juan Luna, and Evan Schneider, along with colleagues, also observed TW Hya with the Chandra X-ray Observatory, with complementary and simultaneous measurements from a suite of other telescopes.
They continuously monitored the star over about seventeen days, during which time they observed both periodic and flaring events on the star.
Click on image to enlargeAn artist’s conception of an icy, planet-forming disk around the young star TW Hydrae. Astronomers have used the Herschel Space Observatory to detect copious amounts of water ice in this source. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Their results show that the star has both a hot solar-like corona and an accretion shock at relatively high densities and small volumes.
Interestingly, the shocked gas heats a larger volume of the stellar atmosphere up to 2 million degrees, much hotter than the 10,000 degree hot spots previously known from optical and ultraviolet spectra.
The new results are able to explain many of the earlier puzzles associated with X-ray emission, help to identify how winds can be produced in these stars, and suggest that the magnetic processes at work in this star are by no means unique but may be ubiquitous in other young stars of similar mass.
The scientists, in a astronomical first, were able to track an accretion flare spectroscopically, providing direct information on how the excitation of the gas evolves during these events.
The team successfully modeled the emission as arising in a sequence: A shock develops from accreting material and then flows down into a turbulent region, heating the star’s photosphere. This ultimately leads to coronal heating and the development of stellar winds.
A Great White shark attacked an adult female sea lion near East Beach in Santa Barbara Tuesday morning. The Harbor Patrol and officials with the Marine Mammal Center responded to the scene and confirmed the shark attack. Peter Howorth, Director of the Marine Mammal Center, tells KEY News they are hoping the animal comes back to land so they can catch it and treat the injury. Howorth says he saw the tooth marks pattern and the diameter is from a Great White. The wound appears infected which means the attack did not occur today and may or may have not happened at East Beach. He says the wound is a few days old. The Parks Department’s policy is to post signs for 72 hours at eight locations along city beaches advising of the attack. Swimmers are told to enter the ocean at their own risk at this time. If more shark sightings occur the signs will be posted for a longer period of time.
Biohazard name:
Great White Shark spotted
Biohazard level:
0/4 —
Biohazard desc.:
This does not included biological hazard category.
Angry bees swarmed two people in Indio, Calif. this morning, sending them to the hospital with almost 200 stings in all. Dr. Wesley Burks, who chairs the University of North Carolina’s pediatrics department and has a 30-year career that involves working with skin allergies, said an attack like that is rare. If fact, he’s never seen one firsthand. “Generally, you see somebody stung once or maybe five to ten times, but not 80 or 100,” Burks said. “I’ve talked to people that have seen them…but it’s less than a handful.” A gardener in Indio, whose name was not released, was trimming a palm tree just before 7 a.m. local time, when he apparently irritated the bees and prompted them to swarm around him, said Matt Kotz, a Riverside County firefighter, in an interview with ABCNews.com. The homeowner, an elderly woman, came out to help, but the bees attacked her as well. When Kotz and the other firefighters arrived, the bees were still attacking the victims on the ground, Kotz said. He said he watched as another crew sprayed the bees with water to fight them off.
The bees stung the woman more than 100 times, and they stung the homeowner more than 80 times, according to the Riverside County Fire Department. Burks said a large number of stings like this can often lead to anaphylactic shock – even if the patient is not allergic to bee stings. Each sting releases proteins into the victim’s body, causing swelling and eventually resulting in a histamine reaction – as if the body were reacting to an allergy. Sometimes, that swelling can even affect the victim’s ability to breath, Burks said. Burks said bee stings generally affect people the same way, regardless of age, but conditions like hypertension and diabetes can make it harder to respond and recover. No firefighters were injured because they wore gloves and bee hoods in addition to their helmets, Kotz said. Although firefighters are trained to kill bees with the same foam they use to put out fire, Kotz said the bees were left alone after the attack. “We didn’t want to kill the swarm,” Kotz said. “Obviously bees do good to the environment…and they weren’t actively stinging.” He said the bees were on private property and posed no risk once the attack ended. The fire department left it up to the homeowner to decide whether to remove them.
Biohazard name:
Bees attack
Biohazard level:
0/4 —
Biohazard desc.:
This does not included biological hazard category.
Beachgoers looking for a day of sun and sand were shocked when they found scores of dead fish scattered over a Florida shore. Two-miles of Ormond Beach were covered with thousands of whiting, spot and sea trout carcases, shrivelling up in the heat. Officials believe the fish were the result of by-catch, extraneous marine life caught unintentionally by commercial fishing boats which is usually discarded. The thousands of fish began to wash ashore around 2 p.m. on Sunday, according to News13. ‘It was packed and we were swimming and swimming,’ said resident Monique Marella. Then the fish came and you sure couldn’t be the water. Everyone just left.’ Determined visitors walked for miles in either direction to escape the dead creatures, but they filled the water and the beach on either end. A Volusia County Beach Patrol captain said that several shrimp boats had been spotted near the shore and they were the likely culprits of the casualties. Lt Tammy Maris said that the incident was not unusual and that no public services would be deployed to clean up the mess. Sunbathers struggled to understand the biblical scene. ‘There’s just so many of them,’ Kevin Soravilla, visiting from New Jersey, said to the News-Journal. ‘I’ve never seen anything like it.’ Lt Maris said that the tide or the hunger of local seagulls would clear up the beach eventually. But not everyone was bothered by the seafood and the smell. ‘I’m here faithfully every day. This is my relaxation,’ Janet Menzel said. ‘They don’t bother me. I can share the beach.’
Biohazard name:
Mass. Die-off (fishes)
Biohazard level:
1/4 Low
Biohazard desc.:
Bacteria and viruses including Bacillus subtilis, canine hepatitis, Escherichia coli, varicella (chicken pox), as well as some cell cultures and non-infectious bacteria. At this level precautions against the biohazardous materials in question are minimal, most likely involving gloves and some sort of facial protection. Usually, contaminated materials are left in open (but separately indicated) waste receptacles. Decontamination procedures for this level are similar in most respects to modern precautions against everyday viruses (i.e.: washing one’s hands with anti-bacterial soap, washing all exposed surfaces of the lab with disinfectants, etc). In a lab environment, all materials used for cell and/or bacteria cultures are decontaminated via autoclave.
EMS crews are at the scene of a possible shark bite in Ocean Isle Beach. Dispatch officials said a 911 call came in around 11:45 a.m. on Tuesday for a shark attack in the 100 block of West First Street. Ocean Isle Beach Police Department officials said first responders are at the scene, but information is not available yet. Few details are known at this time.
Biohazard name:
Shark attack (Non-Fatal)
Biohazard level:
0/4 —
Biohazard desc.:
This does not included biological hazard category.
A food poisoning outbreak from turkey served at the Denver Rescue Mission has sent more than 50 people to the hospital for treatment. Officials said the sickness hit people who ate a turkey dinner consisting of meat that had been donated at the shelter. The Denver Rescue Mission said its taking the matter very seriously. Denver Fire Department spokesman Lt. Phil Champagne told CBS Denver that one of the main concerns is patients who have not sought help. “It certainly is a case-by-case approach with the patients, depending on their particular health, but it could really have dire consequences for patients who aren’t very healthy and who could succumb very quickly by something like this that dehydrates them very quickly,” he said. “We’re concerned that a lot of these people hide — they hide in plain sight, but they are out there in Denver,” said Champagne. “If anyone knows someone (who is sick) don’t hesitate to call 911 and we’ll call and we’ll go out there and take care of these patients.” Crews are searching downtown Denver looking for people who may have been sickened and treating some on the spot who refuse to be transported to the hospital or have less severe cases of food poisoning. Officals say up to 350 people were eating at the shelter.
Biohazard name:
Mass. Food Poisoning
Biohazard level:
1/4 Low
Biohazard desc.:
Bacteria and viruses including Bacillus subtilis, canine hepatitis, Escherichia coli, varicella (chicken pox), as well as some cell cultures and non-infectious bacteria. At this level precautions against the biohazardous materials in question are minimal, most likely involving gloves and some sort of facial protection. Usually, contaminated materials are left in open (but separately indicated) waste receptacles. Decontamination procedures for this level are similar in most respects to modern precautions against everyday viruses (i.e.: washing one’s hands with anti-bacterial soap, washing all exposed surfaces of the lab with disinfectants, etc). In a lab environment, all materials used for cell and/or bacteria cultures are decontaminated via autoclave.
Residents on Lake Memphremagog (Mem-fre-MAY-gog) are asked to be on the lookout for toxic blue-green algae. The algae was spotted on the Canadian side of the lake earlier this month. Algae blooms can irritate the skin and make people sick if ingested. They also can be lethal to pets. The Memphremagog Conservation Inc. says an algae bloom was spotted on the western edge of the lake. The organization says those who saw it said it was spread across a wide area on the lake and into depths of the water. The Caledonian Record ( ) reports that the bloom likely occurred because of hot weather and rain that pushed high levels of runoff containing phorsphorus into the lake’s tributaries.
Biohazard name:
Blue-Green Algae bloom (cyanobacteria)
Biohazard level:
0/4 —
Biohazard desc.:
This does not included biological hazard category.
Symptoms:
Status:
24.07.2012
Biological Hazard
USA
State of Kansas, [Chisholm Creek Park Lake North in Sedgwick County]
The KDHE has issued a toxic algae warning for Chisholm Creek Park Lake North in Sedgwick County. The lake is located off of N. Woodlawn near the K-96 bypass. It’s one of 13 warnings and advisories issued in Kansas. An advisory discourages contact, but a warning means the public should have no contact with the water. It is unsafe to touch. “It will bloom and go through a rapid period of growth. One of the byproducts of this algae- as it dies and goes through it’s life cycle, it releases toxins into the water,” says KDHE Director Tom Langer. Blue green algae can cause allergic-type reactions such as intestinal problems, respiratory problems, or skin irritations.
Biohazard name:
Blue-Green Algae bloom (cyanobacteria)
Biohazard level:
0/4 —
Biohazard desc.:
This does not included biological hazard category.
Firefighters have evacuated some homes in Laconia, N.H., after responding to a situation at an electronics company involving hazardous materials. Firefighters were called to ABC Fabricators after 5 a.m. Tuesday. It was not immediately clear what the problem was. A man who identified himself as the manager said there was a minor chemical spill involving nitric acid, but that it was being treated and cleaned. He said it was under control.
The company makes circuit boards.
Storms rushed through the Chicago area Tuesday morning, leaving at least 183,000 Commonwealth Edison customers without power. Strong to severe thunderstorms moved from the northwest after 6 a.m., bringing heavy rain and damaging winds in excess of 60 mph across a good portion of the metro area. One woman who lives in Chinatown said her house shook in the forceful wind, and on the 2500 block of South Hillock on Chicago’s Southwest Side, a tree toppled onto a home. The Chicago Fire Department confirmed no injuries were reported from the fallen tree. Tree damage and flooding were reported across the area. The 4900 block of North Lawndale Avenue in Chicago was reportedly blocked by fallen trees and branches covered cars. A severe storm warning was in effect until 6:30 a.m. as storm moved through Lake, DuPage, DeKalb, Kane and Kendall counties. A severe thunderstorm watch expired in the Chicago area and Northwest Indiana at 9 a.m. The National Weather Service reported it tracked a line of thunderstorms capable of winds in excess of 70 mph just before 6 a.m. extending from Kildeer to St. Charles. Cloudy skies will replace showers through the afternoon with high temperatures in the mid- to upper-80s. But this isn’t the last of the rain aimed at the area. NBC Chicago meteorologist Andy Avalos is tracking a slight risk for isolated, possible strong to severe thunderstorms for the rest of the day. Mild but muggy conditions return Tuesday night along with another chance of scattered, possibly severe storms Wednesday morning. After clouds break early, near-record heat moves back in as afternoon highs could range from 95 to 100 degrees with heat index readings jumping to 100-108. Yet another chance of storms threatens throughout Thursday, a welcomed sight for Illinois famers and gardeners alike. High temperatures become more comfortable in the mid-80s as a cold front begins to move through.
MessageToEagle.com – There are a number of amazing alien landscapes on Earth and here is one of them!
These stunning images of the Arctic Circle reveal an entire landscape that is transformed into an otherworldly planet.
It looks like a scene taken straight from a science fiction movie.
What are these bizarre white tendrils emerging from the ground?
These images were taken by photographer and an environmental engineering student from Monza, Italy, Niccolo Bonfadini who spent nine days camping alone in the frozen world, which is around 77 square kilometres.The tendrils you see, are frost-covered trees which are located close to the Arctic Circle, where temperatures can drop as low as -40C.
In the dramatic sub-zero conditions, the snow and frost become so thick that everything is covered in a thick blanket.
“I was blown away by the otherworldly landscape, everything was white as far as the eye could see. Everything was frozen.
This is not an alien planet. This is the Arctic Circle! Image credit: Niccolo Bonfadini / Solent News
It was incredible to see how ice would form on top of every free surface. Even my snow shoes and fuel bottles would be covered in ice if I left them outside my tent during the night, said Mr Bonfadini.
Mr Bonfadini sustained himself on powdered freeze-dried food during his trek and slept in his tent.
Trees are covered under the snow. Image credit: Niccolo Bonfadini / Solent News
He said: “I loved what I was doing. I love to go deep into nature alone, to feel the majesty and beauty of Nature. It is absolutely what makes me happiest.
What made the trip harder than average was the fact that I was completely alone, I only met three people during my nine days.
But I prefer it like that, I don’t like crowds.”
Bizarre tendrils emerge from the ground… Image credit: Niccolo Bonfadini / Solent News
Many people who have seen these images have difficult to understand the shapes are actually trees covered with snow.
Mr Bonfadini said: “Some thought they were volcanic eruptions and clouds. To me they seemed to be alive like frozen people.
Every tree was different from the others, they had weird forms, some had snow covered branches that looked like arms.
With such a surreal landscape, it is easy to see how many tales and legends about trolls and other creatures could have been born.”
Snow and frost become so thick the entire landscape is transformed into an otherworldly planet. Image credit: Niccolo Bonfadini / Solent News
He added: “Both the landscape and the sky were white, there were no shades during the day. It was like being in a completely white room and it was even difficult for the eyes to focus.
Sometimes I couldn’t even notice when the path was starting to go downhill because everything looked flat.”
Despite his young age, Mr Bonfadini has photographed wildlife all over the world.
Here the temperatures can drop as low as -40C. Image credit: Niccolo Bonfadini / Solent News
He said: ‘My favourite subjects are the northern countries. I feel a sense of wonder while surrounded by desolate frozen landscapes.
I feel small and vulnerable among the power of Nature. During those moments I really feel alive. Photography motivates me to get out into Nature more often, experiencing conditions and places that I wouldn’t probably have witnessed otherwise.”
MessageToEagle.com – Two eyes can be enough to sometimes give you the feeling you are being watched, but how would you feel if 60 eyes starred at you?
An entirely new kind of species has been discovered in grassland near Cambridge, UK.
The unique animal has 60 eyes, all crammed into a body just 12mm long. It is one of the most unusual animals ever discovered.
This little creature is a worm found by Brian Eversham, chief executive of the Wildlife Trust for Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Northamptonshire.
New record for the UK. A flatworm with as many as 60 eyes. Photo credit Brian Eversham.
Brian Eversham said, “I was taking wildlife pictures one Sunday morning and turned over a log to reveal this rather cute flatworm.It is likely to be a close relative of a species found in Northern Ireland called Kontikia andersoni.
Britain is one of the best countries for documenting wildlife so it’s quite unusual to find a species here which has not been seen before.”
Leading biology expert Dr Hugh Jones believes the flatworm is of antipodean descent but may carry out DNA testing to determine its exact ancestry.
Dr Jones has only seen one specimen of the species in the Netherlands in April this year before Mr Eversham’s discovery. It is thought the flatworm could have originated from New Zealand or Australia.
Photo credit Brian Eversham.
Brian Eversham said “New Zealand seems to be the centre of diversity for land flatworms worldwide, and its climate is very similar to Britain.
Whereas there are millions of undescribed species in the tropics and other poorly-known parts of the world, Britain is the best-documented place on the planet.
It’s quite unusual to find a species here which has not been seen before.”
[In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit, for research and/or educational purposes. This constitutes 'FAIR USE' of any such copyrighted material.]
GOODLAND KS
LINCOLN IL
OMAHA/VALLEY NE
DES MOINES IA
MEMPHIS TN
WILMINGTON NC
SPRINGFIELD MO
HASTINGS NE
TULSA OK
BIRMINGHAM AL
NASHVILLE TN
WICHITA KS
NEWPORT/MOREHEAD CITY NC
SIOUX FALLS SD
ST LOUIS MO
NORMAN OK
NORTH PLATTE NE
The governor of Missouri on Monday declared a state of emergency due to the drought and prolonged severe heat of this summer, which has so far been blamed in the deaths of 25 people in the state. “The high temperatures and dry conditions across the state are taking their toll on Missourians,” Governor Jay Nixon said in a statement. “Our farmers are suffering tremendous losses in crops and livestock, and we’re seeing more heat-related deaths and emergency room visits, particularly among seniors.” The declaration activates the State Emergency Operations Plan, which authorizes state agencies to help local jurisdictions with their emergency responses. The Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services has confirmed 25 heat-related deaths in the state, including 20 in the St. Louis area. The department also has received hospital reports of 829 heat-related emergency department visits from May 1 through July 22. The weather is also causing a high risk of fire, according to the governor’s office. The most expansive drought in the United States in more than half a century has hurt corn and soybean crops. The temperature in St. Louis was 104 Fahrenheit (40 Celsius) Monday, according to the National Weather Service. Through July 21, this year has been the warmest start to a calendar year on record in St. Louis and Columbia, Missouri, the NWS said. Last week, the U.S. Department of Agriculture declared all 114 Missouri counties as primary natural disaster areas, clearing the way for affected farmers to receive federal assistance through low-interest loans, according to Nixon spokesman Scott Holste.
A severe thunderstorm knocked out power to thousands of homes across eastern Ontario on Monday and blasted hail across many parts of the region. At one point Hydro Ottawa reported 8,600 customers had lost power in communities including Gloucester, Goulbourn, Kanata and Nepean as a result of power lines brought down by the storm. As of 8 p.m. ET that number had been reduced to 2,500 customers. Hydro One reported thousands of homes in an area stretching to Alexandria and Cornwall in the east from Barry’s Bay south of Algonquin Park in the west had been affected by outages The largest of these outages, in an area encompassing Renfrew and Calabogie, saw power cut to about 5,600 homes in the region. Service had only been partially restored as of 8 p.m. ET. Ottawa airport, which had cancelled or delayed arriving and departing flights during the storm, reopened just after 7 p.m. ET. The federal weather agency had issued tornado warnings for several eastern Ontario communities west of Ottawa, including Smiths Falls, Lanark, Sharbot Lake, Barry’s Bay, Killaloe, Renfrew, Arnprior, Calabogie and French River.
Ottawa and regions to the east remain under a severe thunderstorm warning into Monday evening. The weather agency said there have been unconfirmed reports of a tornado touching down near Golden Lake about 140 kilometres west of Ottawa. Campers at a trailer park near Lake Doré, close to where the unconfirmed tornado was sighted, say they are shaken up after heavy rains and winds hit at about 2:30 p.m. No injuries have been reported, but trees fell on several trailers at the Lake Doré Tent & Trailer Park, owner Carol Brisebois said. “We could see some trees falling down, lots of damage to trailers, awnings, trees and boats lifted from the shoreline. I had one of my fishing boats, my row boat, went flying,” Brisebois said. Emergency Management Ontario recommends taking cover immediately when threatening weather approaches. Last Tuesday, two tornadoes touched down in eastern Ontario after a similar group of storms rolled through the region. One hit the area of Athens, near Brockville, and another touched down around Summerstown, east of Cornwall.
A firefighter has died and 1,500 tourists have been evacuated after forest fires fanned by strong winds broke out on Croatia’s Adriatic coast. “The situation is very difficult … we are doing everything possible to protect people’s lives and property,” Interior Minister Ranko Ostojic told commercial Nova television, as the fires continued to blaze out of control on Monday in the increasingly popular tourist area. “Everything is ready for (further) evacuations,” said the minister, who visited the coastal resort of Selce, close to the northern port of Rijeka, where some 150 firefighters were battling the blaze. A firefighter died while battling another blaze that broke out near Moscenicka Draga on the Istria peninsula, fire service official Slavko Gaus told national HRT television. That fire was brought under control later in the day. The inferno broke out in the morning in the hinterland of Rijeka, some 180km southwest of Zagreb, and spread towards Selce. Strong winds of more than 100km an hour made tackling the fires very difficult as water-bombing planes could not be used, the authorities said. In Selce some 1,500 tourists from two campsites, mostly Slovenians and Austrians, were evacuated while a number of other tourists left a nearby hotel, officials said. Part of the Adriatic coastal highway was closed, police said. The resort was cut off from electricity and phone lines were down, Nova television reported, showing footage of people in Selce covering their faces with scarves to protect themselves from the thick smoke and ashes. The roofs of several houses also caught fire.
An aerial photograph released by the Ministry of Natural Resources Pembroke District Office Sunday shows the wildfire at CFB Petawawa as it burned on Friday. The blaze has been contained to a 210-hectare area, however, officials don’t consider it under control yet.
Credits: QMI AGENCY
SEAN CHASE | QMI AGENCY
OTTAWA — A wildfire raging at CFB Petawawa is not spreading into neighbouring Algonquin Park, but officials Sunday feared that could change if the weather deteriorates.
Overcast skies over the region were a sign that things could get worse for firefighters battling the blaze, which has burned up 210 hectares since Thursday in the far western reaches of the base’s training area.
Environment Canada has forecasted a 60% chance of showers with the risk of a thunderstorm in the evening. Those storms might generate lightening strikes that could spawn more fires in the area.
A second fire on the base, which was discovered Saturday, has grown to five hectares, base officials confirmed Sunday.
“The fire is not considered under control but is growing slowly at this time,” said Capt. Sally Ann Cyr, public affairs officer for 2 Canadian Mechanized Brigade Group.
The main fire was largely contained within a perimeter established by firefighters with the Department of National Defence assisted by heavy equipment operators from 2 Combat Engineer, who used bulldozers to dig out fire lanes to contain the flames.
The ministry of natural resources (MNR) also confirmed that the fire is situated south of Montgomery Lake, the site of an abandoned boy scout camp, and remains 100 metres from the Algonquin Park boundary.
The area has largely been clear cut over the years so that the military could construct a Forward Operating Base (FOB) in order to train soldiers for overseas missions.
“We’re in an extreme fire response situation,” MNR spokesman Doug Skeggs said.
The fire is still classified as “not under control” due to the ever-changing wind and weather conditions. The possibility of thunderstorms is causing great concern for firefighters, he added.
“There’s not a great deal of rain associated with those storms,” he said. “So we are looking at the potential for thunder strikes and new (fire) outbreaks.”
A fire behaviour expert with the MNR is on the scene assisting the base fire department with developing fire suppression strategies, while the ministry continues to fly in helicopters to dump water on the flames.
Meanwhile, the evacuation of five campsites inside the park is complete. Park wardens ordered up to 400 people to leave the area on Friday night. It was more challenging locating the campers already canoeing on the Petawawa and Barron rivers and isolated interior lakes, Skeggs said, adding he doesn’t believe there are any stragglers left behind.
“We believe we’ve got everybody but we are continuing to patrol,” he said.
The mandatory closure of the east side of Algonquin Park, ordered on Friday, affected access to Sec Lake gate, McManus Lake gate, Achray Grand Lake gate and Lake Traverse in the park, plus all Crown land between the park boundary and Barron Canyon Road, the main access point.
Ontario Provincial Police and Ontario Parks employees continued Sunday to man roadblocks on Barron Canyon Road west of Petawawa.
Torrential rain that exploded over the Western Bay of Plenty closed one of the region’s major highways and left people stranded at home as floodwaters rose and rivers burst their banks. A heavy rain warning is in place and flooding is expected to affect a number of Western Bay roads until midday today. All areas of the Western Bay fell victim to the ferocious weather but northern areas were the hardest hit. A family was trapped in its Karangahake Gorge home yesterday after the Ohinemuri River burst its banks. The state highway was closed where the floodgates were up at Criterion Bridge. Along the gorge, the swollen river spilled over the barrier and over both lanes of traffic. Wendy Hillerich said in her 23 years in the gorge, she had never experienced conditions as extreme as they were yesterday. “I have never seen it this bad. The river is across both lanes and there’s no way anyone is getting through at the moment,” she said. “The past 48 hours have been really heavy … and the bridges that wind through the gorge, there would be less than half a metre of space under them. That’s how high the water is.” Mrs Hillerich, and her husband Horst, own the Ohinemuri Estate. Visiting friends were caught by the floodwaters and were forced to spend the night, she said.
“We’re totally stranded. There’s no way we can move in any direction.” People in Waihi Beach were stranded as both roads heading into and out of the town were closed for the afternoon and evening. Waihi Beach Rd closed about 3pm while the Athenree Gorge closed shortly after because of a slip. One lane in the gorge was re-opened about 8pm. An NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) spokesperson said a work crew were due to begin to clean up the slip today. NZTA advised motorists to use State Highway 29 via Tauranga over the Kaimai Range and avoid SH2 until floodwaters recede. At the Waihi Beach Top 10 Holiday Park, owner Ian Smith said the heavy rain in Waihi caused serious flooding at the northern end of the beach. He said the rain had caused the Waihi Beach stream to overflow and caused quite a lot of damage to the park. Traffic was delayed in Katikati after flooding on SH2, south of the Uretara Stream bridge, forced one lane to close for the afternoon. North of the township motorists had to negotiate knee-deep water across the highway. The jetty at The Landing on Beach Rd was completely submerged and the Haiku Reserve at the back of Katikati’s central business district was flooded with water lapping the top of the Haiku pedestrian bridge.
Katikati College and Katikati Primary Schools closed early due to the threat of further flooding. The high tide at 10pm yesterday was likely to affect the Uretara, Criterion and Hikuai Bridges. NZTA said this could result in further closures of the bridges. In Papamoa, flooding caused the northbound lane of SH2 to close between Bruce Rd and Domain Rd last night. NZTA Bay of Plenty state highway manager, Brett Gliddon, said the heavy rain and surface flooding caused a number of potholes in areas that were resealed last week. At 9pm yesterday he said contractors were on site to repair the road. “Repairs are being carried out as quickly as possible to enable the highway to be restored to two lanes by morning. We ask motorists to reduce their speed and take extreme care when travelling in this area,” he said. In Tauranga City almost 100mm of rain fell from 7am to 7pm yesterday. Similar levels were expected to fall last night before the rain was due to ease today. MetService forecaster Mad Naeraa said the worst of the weather had passed but it would take some time for the surface flooding and rivers to subside.
Motorists wade through a street flooded by heavy rains brought by Tropical Storm Ferdie in Quezon City, Metro Manila on July 21, 2012. Several colleges in Metro Manila suspended classes on Saturday due to a heavy downpour that began early morning. — PHOTO: REUTERS
MANILA (AFP) – Two people were killed and six others are missing in the Philippines as floods inundated parts of Manila and nearby areas while a storm tore through the country’s north, authorities said on Saturday.
The civil defence office said rescuers are on standby to help residents evacuate if necessary as creeks and open sewers in the capital overflowed from overnight rains, swamping nearby slums and causing traffic jams.
The rains began to ease by midday after plunging some areas in knee-deep waters, but civil defence chief Benito Ramos said he could not rule out further flooding as runoff from nearby mountains descends into Manila Bay.
‘All that rain up there would eventually find their way here,’ he told AFP, referring to the mountains to the east of Manila.
Authorities in central Nigeria say a flood triggered by heavy rains killed at least 35 people.
Plateau state Red Cross chief Mnasseh Pampe said Monday several other Jos residents remain missing and rescue forces expect the death toll to rise further.
He says the flood waters washed away many homes in the area — often built with mud — leaving some 200 residents displaced.
Nigeria is currently experiencing its annual rainy season, which comes with torrential rains that challenge the country’s infrastructure, often leading buildings to collapse and people to drown as many build houses in flood plains.
The Oyster Creek nuclear plant in Lacey Township was shut down early today after a power failure, according to plant owner Exelon. Electrical service from the outside grid was disrupted at around 3:41 a.m., and the plant’s emergency diesel generators kicked in and powered the plant’s safety systems, said a statement from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The problem appeared to be a grounded 230-kilovolt line, according to the NRC. Jersey Central Power & Light crews fixed the problem a little after 5:30 a.m., Exelon said. Afterwards the plant was taken to cold shutdown, in which the reactor and associated systems are cooled down and depressurized, according to the NRC. The plant will likely start up again in a matter of days, said Exelon spokeswoman Suzanne D’Ambrosio. “We make sure the plant is shut down and cooled down and then if there’s any little maintenance we need to do we may take advantage of down time to do that,” D’Ambrosio said. “Obviously with the hot summer it’s in our best interest to get running as soon as possible, but it’s a very slow and deliberate process.” Oyster Creek produces 636 megawatts of electricity at full power, enough electricity for about 600,000 homes.
The security situation in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) province of North Kivu has been deteriorating for months because of armed conflict between various renegade soldier groups. The fighting has resulted in the displacement of approximately 250,000 people from the area fleeing the violence in search of safety. Health concerns have also risen in violence-ridden areas of the eastern DRC. According to a World Health Organization (WHO) Global Alert and Response (GAR) issued Monday, the DRC has reported a sharp increase in the number of cholera cases in the armed conflict area of North Kivu. For the three weeks spanning June 11 to July 1, 368 new cases of cholera were reported. Because of the lack of security in the area, there is a concern those stricken with cholera will have difficulty in accessing the health-care facilities and could increase the number of severe and fatal cases. The WHO also reports the fear of the cholera spilling over the borders into neighboring countries Burundi, Rwanda, South Sudan and Uganda. Médecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) and its partners blame the outbreak on a lack of potable drinking water.
Patients are being treated with infusions and antibiotics as appropriate, at treatment centres. Interventions to control the epidemic that are being carried out include education and communication; management of cases; increased surveillance; hygiene and sanitation; and provision of safe drinking water.WHO is working to support national authorities in response to the cholera outbreak and the broader humanitarian emergency resulting from conflict and population displacement. Cholera is an acute bacterial intestinal disease characterized by sudden onset, profuse watery stools (given the appearance as rice water stools because of flecks of mucus in water) due to a very potent enterotoxin. The enterotoxin leads to an extreme loss of fluid and electrolytes in the production of diarrhea. It has been noted that an untreated patient can lose his bodyweight in fluids in hours resulting in shock and death. It is caused by the bacterium, Vibrio cholerae. Serogroups O1 and O139 are the types associated with the epidemiological characteristics of cholera (outbreaks). The bacteria are acquired through ingestion of contaminated water or food through a number of mechanisms. Water is usually contaminated by the feces of infected individuals.
Drinking water can be contaminated at the source, during transport or during storage at home.Food can be contaminated by soiled hands, during preparation or while eating. Beverages and ice prepared with contaminated water and fruits and vegetables washed with this water are other examples. Some outbreaks are linked to raw or undercooked seafood. The incubation for cholera can be from a few hours to 5 days. As long as the stools are positive, the person is infective. Some patients may become carriers of the organism which can last for months. Cholera is diagnosed by growing the bacteria in culture. Treatment consists of replacement of fluids lost, intravenous replacement in severe cases. Doxycycline or tetracycline antibiotic therapy can shorten the course of severe disease. According to Wikipedia, North Kivu is a province bordering Lake Kivu in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. Its capital is Goma. North Kivu borders the provinces of Orientale to the north and northwest, Maniema to the southwest, and South Kivu to the south. To the east, it borders the countries of Uganda and Rwanda.
Biohazard name:
Cholera Outbreak
Biohazard level:
2/4 Medium
Biohazard desc.:
Bacteria and viruses that cause only mild disease to humans, or are difficult to contract via aerosol in a lab setting, such as hepatitis A, B, and C, influenza A, Lyme disease, salmonella, mumps, measles, scrapie, dengue fever, and HIV. “Routine diagnostic work with clinical specimens can be done safely at Biosafety Level 2, using Biosafety Level 2 practices and procedures. Research work (including co-cultivation, virus replication studies, or manipulations involving concentrated virus) can be done in a BSL-2 (P2) facility, using BSL-3 practices and procedures. Virus production activities, including virus concentrations, require a BSL-3 (P3) facility and use of BSL-3 practices and procedures”, see Recommended Biosafety Levels for Infectious Agents.
On July 23rd, a coronal mass ejection (CME) blasted away from the sun with rare speed: 3400 km/s or 7.6 million mph. CMEs moving this fast occur only once every ~5 to 10 years. The Solar and Heliospheric Observatory recorded the cloud’s rapid departure from the sun:
The source of the CME was sunspot AR1520, which sparked many bright auroras earlier this montth when it was on the Earthside of the sun. Now, however, the active region is transiting the sun’s farside so this blast was not geoeffective. One can only imagine the geomagnetic storms such a fast CME could produce if it were heading our way.
Update: According to a forecast track prepared by analysts at the Goddard Space Weather Lab, this CME will miss all of the solar system’s inner planets
Strong Far Side Solar Flare – Protons Rising July 23, 2012
Proton Flux Rising July 23, 2012 – 10:36:02 UTC
There was a large eruption from the 1520 sunspot group after it had turned the limb to the far side as seen on stereo ahead. Earth’s magnetic portal foot print was on the back side and very close to the eruption.
A monitoring crew has found a leak inside one of the igloos at the Pueblo Chemical Depot where mustard agent is stored. The storage igloo contains 105 mm projectiles with chemical weapons inside which date back more than fifty years. All the weapons are scheduled for destruction and the plant to destroy them is under construction. This is a fairly common occurrence. When a leaking projectile is found it is sealed in a special case until it can be destroyed.
MessageToEagle.com – Solar Max is due in the year 2013. NASA scientists make analysis of recent solar activity. and say that it’s still more to come.
When solar maximum arrives, the peak of 11-year sunspot cycle will bring more solar flares, more coronal mass ejections, more geomagnetic storms and more auroras than we have experienced in quite some time.
On the weekend of July 14, 2012, sky watchers around the world got a taste of things to come.
It was mid-Saturday in North America when a coronal mass ejection or “CME” crashed into Earth’s magnetic field and triggered the most sustained display of auroras in years. For more than 36 hours, magnetic storms circled Earth’s poles.
Northern Lights spilled across the Canadian border into the United States as far south as California, Colorado, Kansas, and Arkansas.
In the southern hemisphere, skies turned red over Tasmania and New Zealand, while the aurora australis pirouetted around the South Pole.
The source of the CME was giant sunspot AR1520, a seething nest of tangled magnetism more than 15 times wider than Earth itself.
On July 12th, the sunspot’s magnetic field erupted, producing an X-class solar flare and hurling a billion tons of electrified plasma toward our planet.
An experimental NASA computer model of the incoming CME predicted its arrival at Earth on July 14th. Credit: Goddard Space Weather Lab. animation
NASA’s twin STEREO probes and the European Space Agency’s Solar and Heliospheric Observatory monitored the CME as it billowed away from the sun. Using those data, analysts at NOAA and NASA successfully predicted the cloud’s arrival time.
It would take almost two full days for the CME to cross the 93 million mile void between Earth and sun.
The CME’s impact sharply compressed Earth’s magnetosphere, briefly exposing geosynchronous satellites to solar wind plasma. The shaking of Earth’s magnetic field caused compass needles to swing–just a little–and prompted electrical currents to flow through the soil at high latitudes. p> Fortunately, the strike did no harm; satellites survived and power grids stayed online.
Click on image to enlargeAurora, Pawnee Grasslands, CR-61, ColoradoThis was the first time I ever saw an aurora. It is very rare that they are visible from Northern Colorado. As soon as I stepped out of the car, the northern sky appeared as it was on fire. I imaged the event for a good 30 minutes before the Moon-Venus-Jupiter conjunction rose above the horizon. To see the two events side-by-side was incredible! Date: 2012-07-15 Camera: Canon XSi (modified) Lens: Canon 50mm f/1.4 Mount: Astrotrac Shot: 13-panel Mosaic 13×8 seconds f/2.5 ISO 1600 Processing: Photoshop, Topaz. Robert Arn
Click on image to enlargeAurora, Ozark, AR, USAThere was a very faint red glow off and on most of the night but around 2am CDT it began increasing. Around 3am and 330am there were pretty good outburst. The red was naked eye visible at times after 2am but the outburst that included some tall columns was much more visible with the naked eye. Canon T2i. Photo Credits: Brian Emfinger
Click on image to enlargeAurora, Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station, Jul. 15, 2012Hi, besides being inside the oval, we had some crazy auroras the last few days. The last 6 days were the best of the whole winter so far, and we got really nice clear skies as well, but we buy it with temperatures below -100F for more than 24h now, coldest today was around -105F, -76°C both images Canon 7D, 8mm, f3.5, 5sec, iso 6400 cheers, Robert http://www.antarctic-adventures.de. Photo Credit: Robert Schwarz
Next came the light show. As the CME’s wake washed across Earth, the polar regions of our planet lit up like a Christmas tree. Red, green, blue and purple auroras capped both ends of the planet, glowing, dancing, and ultimately spreading to places where auroras are seldom seen.
In Arkansas, for instance, “there was a faint glow off and on for most of the night,” reports Brad Emfinger from a little town called Ozark. “Around 3am there was an outburst of red and purple plainly visible to the naked eye.”
In Pawnee Grasslands, Colorado, photographer Robert Arn saw the Northern Lights for the first time ever: “As soon as I stepped out of the car, the sky looked like it was on fire.
Then the Moon, Venus and Jupiter rose together in the east. To see the conjunction and the auroras side-by-side was incredible!”
Meanwhile at the other end of the planet, “auroras were going crazy over the South Pole,” reports Robert Schwarz at the Amundsen-Scott south pole research station “We enjoyed the show under crystal clear skies with an air temperature of minus 105 degrees F.”
In Ashland, Wisconsin, on the other hand, John Welling watched the show in his shirt sleeves:
“Tonight was absolutely the best with a comfortable temperature of +78 degrees F and Northern Lights dancing overhead. The X-flare definitely lived up to the hype.”
From one end of the planet to the other, spanning more than 90 degrees of combined north-south latitude, 183 degrees of temperature, and 360 degrees of longitude, this was truly a global space weather event. And it was just a taste of things to come
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An aerial view over the Tongariro National Park. Photo / Greg Bowker
A “sudden rise” in volcanic activity at Mt Tongariro has prompted scientists to lift its volcanic alert status for the first time.
But local businesses and conservation authorities remain unconcerned as they seek to reassure visitors it is “business as usual” at National Park.
GNS Science this afternoon lifted Mt Tongariro’s volcanic alert status from level zero to level one, and increased the aviation status from green to yellow.
It said a series of more than 20 “small” volcanic earthquakes had been recorded at Tongariro since July 13 – more than the average of two per year according to historic seismic data.
The quakes, below a magnitude of 2.5 and between 2-7km deep, were recorded in a cluster zone between Emerald Crater and Te Maari craters.
The sequence of earthquakes soon declined but restarted on Wednesday and increased in number yesterday and today.
GNS volcanologist Brad Scott said it was the first time the alert level had been lifted at Tongariro since the alert system was introduced.
“It’s displaying some form of unrest. We don’t know exactly what’s driving it, if we did we’d be saying.”
To get a clearer picture, GNS would deploy portable seismic recorders around the epicentres of the earthquakes and conduct sampling of selected hot springs, crater lakes and fumaroles in the area.
“We’ve got our permanent networks out giving us data in real time… (and) we want to compliment that with some more data, just to add to our knowledge.”
Mt Tongariro is a volcanic complex that lies to the north of Ngauruhoe and consists of numerous craters and vents.
There are six alert levels of volcanic action, increasing in seriousness from zero to five. Alert level one indicates “signs of volcano unrest”.
For the alert level to be lifted to two – “minor eruptive activity” – there would need to be an eruption and there was no indication that would happen.
The aviation status yellow also acts as a warning of increased unrest.
Department of Conservation local conservation analyst Harry Keys said GNS Science was dealing with the matter and the department did not need to take any action at this stage.
The popular Tongariro Alpine Crossing passed close to Te Maari craters, where the most recent ash eruptions took place from 1855 to 1897.
But there was no hazard at the moment and the crossing would remain open to the public.
“There are public safety matters if the volcano starts getting active, but at the moment the volcano is not getting active and it may not ever get active,” he said.
“We’ve got everything ready if we have to do anything. We will then go to the next stage, but at the moment we’re not doing anything.”
Dr Keys said he would not expect more or fewer visitors at the moment.
“It’s definitely business as usual. People might make their own decisions, but there’s no reason at the moment they should make any decisions about what they’ve planned.”
National Park Business Association chairman Murray Wilson said the only problem with volcanic activity was when it interrupted visitor flows.
He had been at a regional tourism meeting today but the issue was not even raised.
“It’s just a fact of life around here and I don’t think anyone around the place will be to excited about that – it’s probably more of a technical response than a physical response.”
Mr Wilson said “media hype” had been the biggest issue the last time neighbouring Ruapehu had erupted in the 1990s.
“The people around here depend on uninterrupted visitor flows. Last year we had interrupted visitor flows because of the Rugby World Cup – as soon as the rugby started, people tended to stay at home and go to the rugby matches.”
He did not think there would be much impact unless it was “over-reported and people get worried”.
WELLINGTON, New Zealand — A strong earthquake has struck off the east coast of New Zealand, but there were no immediate reports of any injuries or damage.
The U.S. Geological Survey says the magnitude-5.8 temblor struck Saturday off the east coast of the North Island at a depth of 20 kilometers (12 miles).
New Zealand is prone to earthquakes. In February 2011, a strong quake in Christchurch killed 185 people and destroyed much of the city’s downtown area.
This is an illustration showing how the mantle plumes can be emitted from the core-mantle boundary region to reach the Earth’s crust. Due to the lateral displacement of the tectonic plates at the surface, the mantle plumes can create a series of aligned hot spot volcanoes. A mid ocean ridge and a subducted plate are also shown. Credit: ESRF/Denis Andrault/Henri Samuel. For a larger version of this image please go here.
Scientists have recreated the extreme conditions at the boundary between Earth’s core and its mantle, 2,900 km beneath the surface. Using the world’s most brilliant beam of X-rays, they probed speck-sized samples of rock at very high temperature and pressure to show for the first time that partially molten rock under these conditions is buoyant and should segregate towards the Earth’s surface.
This observation is a strong evidence for the theory that volcanic hotspots like the Hawaiian Islands originate from mantle plumes generated at the Earth’s core-mantle boundary. The results are published in Nature dated 19 July 2012.
The group of scientists was led by Denis Andrault from the Laboratoire Magmas et Volcans of University Blaise Pascal in Clermont, and included scientists from the CNRS in Clermont and the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF) in Grenoble, France.
Most volcanoes are situated where continental plates are pushed or pulled against each other. Here, the continental crust is weakened, and the magma can break through to the surface. The Pacific “Ring of Fire”, for example, exhibits such plate movements, resulting in powerful Earthquakes and numerous active volcanoes.
Volcanic hotspots are of a completely different nature because most of them are far away from plate boundaries. The Hawaiian Islands, for example, are a chain of volcanoes thought to have their origin in a mysterious hot spot beneath the Pacific ocean floor. Every island in the chain starts as an active volcano fed by the hot spot that eventually rises above the ocean surface. As plate tectonics move the volcano away from the hotspot, it becomes extinct.
The hot spot will in the meantime create another volcano: the next island in the chain. The Hawaiian Islands are one of many examples of this process, like the Canary Islands, La Reunion or the Azores.
The nature of the hot-spot source and its location in the mantle have remained elusive to the present day. One explanation is narrow streams of magma conveyed to the Earth’s surface from the boundary between the Earth’s core of liquid iron and the solid mantle of silicate rock. Whether the lowermost mantle expels such streams of magma called mantle plumes is one of today’s major controversies among geologists.
What material can be stored at the core-mantle boundary and become sufficiently light to rise through 2900 km of thick solid mantle? This was the question Denis Andrault and his colleagues addressed when they set out to recreate in a laboratory the conditions found at the core-mantle boundary.
They compressed tiny pieces of rock, the size of a speck of dust and ten times thinner than a human hair, between the tips of two conical diamonds to a pressure of more than one million bar. A laser beam then heated these samples to temperatures between 3000 and 4000 degrees Celsius, which scientists believe is representative of the 200km-thick core-mantle boundary. The samples are extremely small compared to the natural processes occurring in the Earth.
However, the melting processes are very well reproduced experimentally. Therefore, the observations can be confidently transferred from micron scale in the experiments to kilometre scale in the deep mantle.
Beams of X-rays at the ESRF, focused to a diameter of one 1000th of a millimetre, were used to map these samples and identify where the solid rock had melted. “Obviously, these tiny samples produce weak interaction signals, and this is why it is important to have the most brilliant X-ray beams for this type of experiments, says Mohammed Mezouar, the scientist responsible for the high-pressure beamline ID27 at the ESRF.
Once regions with molten rock had been identified, another X-ray technique was used at the ESRF to compare the chemical compositions of previously molten and solid parts. “It is the iron content which is decisive for the density of molten rock at the core-mantle boundary. Its accurate knowledge allowed us to determine that molten rock under these conditions is actually lighter than solid,” says Denis Andrault.
Gravity makes the light liquid rock from a hotspot move slowly upwards like a bubble in water until it reaches the surface where the magma plume will form a volcano. The hotspots of liquid occur in the relatively thin boundary region between the solid lower mantle and the liquid outer core of the Earth where the temperature rises over a distance of just 200 kilometres from 3000 to 4000 degrees. This steep rise is caused by the vicinity of the much hotter core and induces a partial melting of the rocks.
The results of the experiment are also of great significance for the understanding of the early history of the Earth, as they provide an explanation why many chemical elements playing a key role in our daily life gradually accumulated from the Earth’s inside to its thin crust, close to the surface.
“We know less about the Earth’s mantle than about the surface of Mars. It is impossible to drill a hole of even 100 kilometres into the Earth, so we have to recreate it in the laboratory. This is important knowledge, because active hot spot volcanoes like those in Iceland can be dangerous and disruptive for the daily lives of people far away”, concludes Denis Andrault.
FORT WORTH TX
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SPRINGFIELD MO
NORMAN OK
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GOODLAND KS
SIOUX FALLS SD
NORTH PLATTE NE
WICHITA KS
ST LOUIS MO
At least 12 people died during torrential rainstorms which battered much of northern and southwestern China from Friday night to Saturday, state media reported. In Beijing, strong winds blew off rooftops killing two people and injuring six others, the Beijing Emergency Medical Center reported. Heavy rain flooded roads and caused 223 flights to be cancelled in the capital, as the Beijing Meteorological Bureau issued its second-highest rainstorm alert for the first time since 2005. The report said Beijing received 95 mm of precipitation on average as of 7:00 pm (1100 GMT), and heavy rainfall is expected to last until Sunday morning.
The Interior Ministry sent a military transport plane with 83 firefighters to Madeira, where the flames briefly threatened the outskirts of the region’s capital and popular tourist destination Funchal on Wednesday night. Interior Minister Miguel Macedo also flew to Madeira to coordinate the efforts.
Firefighters from several departments started fighting a fast-spreading brush fire east of Ash Grove near U.S. 160 at Farm Road 43. Firefighters were dispatched at about 9 a.m. to fight a brush fire that was originally reported to be two acres in size. Crews from Everton, Bois D’Arc, Willard, Ash Grove and Walnut Grove worked to prevent the fire from spreading to a field with a machine shed in it. The fire spread to the outer edge of U.S. 160 close to at least one home. It wasn’t the peace and quiet for sleeping Stan Pyle planned on. “I work night shift at French’s, and I actually got home and got to bed. My wife just woke me up and said there’s a fire across the street, and my son and I hook up all the garden hoses we had,” Pyle says. Ash Grove and Walnut Grove firefighters were the first on the scene. “We had approximately two acres when we first got here, but the winds pushed it pretty fast on us,” says Ash Grove Fire Chief Anthony Monnig.
Firefighters contained a brush fire that threatened homes south of Horseshoe Bend Thursday afternoon. Officials tell us that about 10 to 20 homes on Horseshoe Bend Hill were evacuated. A spokesperson for the Bureau of Land Management said a lot of resources were put on the Summit Fire to keep it from spreading and destroying homes. Fire departments from Horseshoe Bend, Eagle and the BLM responded. Six fire engines, five structure protection units, two water tenders, one bulldozer, two helicopters and one plane were called to the scene. Windy conditions and dry brush fueled the fire, which burned around 100 acres. One outbuilding was lost in the fire. The fire was reported around 2:20 p.m. “When you do get a grass fire that burns hot and fast, those homes are usually in the direct path of that,” said Nevil Humphreys of the Eagle Fire Department. The fire burned to within about a quarter-mile of Highway 55, but the road remained open to traffic. Boise County Sheriff’s deputies went door-to-door urging residents near the fire to evacuate their homes.
The Kreitzer family lives in one of the homes that was evacuated. They were all out of the house when the fire started. Ingrid Kreitzer said their neighbor alerted them to the fire. “He called and he said, ‘You know, I think you probably should come up. It looks like it might be coming closer. You might just want to come down and hose anything in case it jumps over,’” Kreitzer said. She said with all the recent fires, her family had been creating a fire plan in case of the wildfire. Crews on the scene told us homes they saw had good defensible space, helping to keep them safe. “We were able to get in there, limb up some brush and what not,” said Paul Story, a firefighter who came in with his crew from Salt Lake to help with recent fires. “It was very minimal effort on our part, and so the homeowner did a good job in that regard.” Humphreys said the fire is human-caused and remains under investigation. No homes were destroyed in the fire.
Weather forecasters see no end in sight to the worst US drought in five decades, a blistering heatwave that has wilted crops across America’s crucial breadbasket and sent grain prices soaring.
Farmers are mulling cutting down crops and thinning livestock herds as meteorologists said the country’s central breadbasket, the world’s largest source of both soybeans and corn, faces another month of stifling, rainless heat.
Top US agriculture official Tom Vilsack announced Wednesday he was designating 39 more counties in eight states as “natural disaster areas,” making farmers there eligible for low-cost emergency loans. Nearly 1,300 counties across 29 states have been designated natural disaster areas this year.
Vilsack also met with President Barack Obama Wednesday to review options to deal with the drought.
Meanwhile, a World Bank official said they were watching to see how the drought could impact global food supplies, after sharp surges in food prices in 2008 and 2010 dealt harsh blows to poor, food-importing nations.
“While it’s too early to be overly concerned, the Bank is monitoring the situation closely for potential impacts on our clients,” said Marc Sadler, team leader for the World Bank’s Agricultural Finance and Risk Management Unit.
“Global stocks in most of the tradable grains are lower now than they have been historically… we don’t have as much in the larder as we used to.”
More than 60 percent of the continental United States has been under drought and extreme heat conditions since June, according to Mark Svoboda of the National Drought Mitigation Center in Lincoln, Nebraska.
Temperatures have topped 100 degrees Fahrenheit (38 Celsius) for days in a row in many places, with the central plains running three to four degrees Fahrenheit above normal this month.
Svoboda said the drought was as tough as the worst in the 1930s and 1950s, although those benchmarks were multi-season, multi-year disasters while the current situation only dates to May.
But, he pointed out, the timing of the lack of rain and the heat has been particularly devastating, coming just at the peak of the growing season with the epicenter the central US farm belt east of the Rocky Mountains all the way to the Atlantic coast.
It has hit corn, soybeans, and crops like hay needed to feed cattle especially hard.
Farmers are now looking at cutting their losses — chopping down fields of half-mature, ear-less corn to feed the stalks to cattle.
“The jury is still a little bit out on it. We are in that process right now, making that decision,” said Steve Foglesong, who raises cattle and farms corn in Astoria, Illinois.
“From the road the corn looks green, but there are no ears on it.”
Foglesong said the next two weeks will be crucial, but weather forecasters were not encouraging.
“The worst of the drought is right in the middle of the nation, the corn belt. It’s just been bone dry,” said Carl Erickson, a meteorologist at Accuweather.
“Unfortunately across the central plains, the Mississippi valley, it looks like the overall pattern will remain in place for the rest of the month and into August,” he said.
“Once you get into a pattern like this, it almost feeds on itself.”
Joseph Glauber, chief economist for the Department of Agriculture, said their surveys show that 38 percent of the corn crop, and 30 percent of the soybean crop, are considered in “poor” or “extremely poor” condition.
That compares to 9 percent and 8 percent respectively this time last year.
In the last big drought, in 1988, corn yields fell by more than 20 percent, Glauber noted. Although the department will wait until early August before reaching a conclusion about the crops, he said: “It’s evolving as we speak. Every week these crop conditions have gotten worse.”
Corn prices have soared by 50 percent since May, while the rate for soybeans, which develop later than corn and might be able to bear up under another few weeks of rainless conditions, has surged 26 percent.
Ironically, in a way, beef and other meat prices have fallen. Glauber said some ranchers facing higher feed prices appear to be reducing their herds, pushing livestock into the market.
Foglesong said that in addition, from what he can tell the heat wave has been so intense around so much of the country that consumers have curtailed their summer barbecues, also hitting demand for steaks, ribs and other products.
Over the longer term, Glauber said, the herd reductions will mean tighter supplies and higher prices for meat on top of the grains.
Svoboda said that the crops aren’t the only problem. The drought has already fed devastating wildfires in the west, and if it keeps on, he predicts cities will start running into limits on their water supplies, which could lead to water use controls.
Tropical storm Khanun destroyed scores of houses, buildings and transportation infrastructure in southern parts of North Korea this week, killing at least seven people in the reclusive state, state-run media reported on Friday. It weakened quickly over North Korea before Khanun’s remnants dissipated over China. The state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported on Friday that flooding triggered by Khanun caused significant damage and casualties in the southern regions of North Korea. It said at least seven people were killed in Kangwon Province, but few other details about casualties were released. “Many hectares of farmland were inundated in Kangwon province and some dwelling houses, public buildings, railways, roads, bridges, breakwaters, electric supply and communication networks were destroyed,” KCNA said in its report, adding that some areas saw up to 200 millimeters (7.8 inches) of rain. “The water supply system was paralyzed in Wonsan and Munchon cities, suspending the provision of drinking water to citizens.” In South Hwanghae province, several houses were destroyed in Haeju City and Jaeryong County while large areas of cropland were submerged in Unchon County. The report did not say whether there were casualties in South Hwanghae province, or in any other regions of North Korea. In South Korea, Khanun also caused flooding, power outages, and affected major transportation systems. One fatality was reported in North Gyeongsang province when the wall of a home collapsed, officials said.
A North Carolina mall was evacuated Friday when a thunderstorm that produced heavy rain caused the ceiling to collapse, officials said. The ceiling at SouthPark collapsed around 5 p.m., said Charlotte Fire Department Capt. Rob Brisley. He said by the time firefighters were dispatched to the mall, an evacuation was already under way. Brisley said firefighters also pulled the alarm systems in the mall to help with the evacuation, which he described as orderly. No injuries were reported. Brisley said firefighters were focusing on making sure the building was safe, and that the water damage could be addressed by mall workers. Mall personnel couldn’t be reached for additional comment Friday afternoon. It’s estimated that up to 3 inches of rain fell on south Charlotte in approximately 45 minutes, said Rodney Hinson, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service office in Greer, S.C. Hinson said additional rain was likely to pass over Charlotte Friday night.
Mudslides unleashed by torrential rains killed one man, wrecked houses and cut off villages in the Austrian province of Styria, authorities said on Saturday. Police in the southeastern province said they had found the body of a 47-year-old local man swept away by a mudslide on Friday night in the town of Thoerl. Several small communities near Liezen were stranded by blocked roads. Austrian broadcaster ORF said helicopters evacuated around 20 people from the area after mudslides up to 10 meters (30 feet) high made travel by road impossible. A further 360 people had to leave their homes in the town of Sankt Lorenzen for fear of more slides given unrelenting rainfall, authorities said.
Director of Disease Prevention and Control at the Ministry of Health and Sanitation, Dr. Amara Jambai, has yesterday disclosed that the outbreak of Lassa fever in Kenema district. Lassa fever is a viral disease which is carried by rats. It is spread from infected rodents to humans through direct contact with urine and droppings of an infected rat. Speaking to journalists at the weekly press briefing at the Ministry of Information and Communications, Dr. Jambai said the outbreak, which started in three districts but has extended to other parts of the country, should be a serious concern to the government and people of Sierra Leone.
Biohazard name:
Lassa Fever Outbreak
Biohazard level:
4/4 Hazardous
Biohazard desc.:
Viruses and bacteria that cause severe to fatal disease in humans, and for which vaccines or other treatments are not available, such as Bolivian and Argentine hemorrhagic fevers, H5N1(bird flu), Dengue hemorrhagic fever, Marburg virus, Ebola virus, hantaviruses, Lassa fever, Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever, and other hemorrhagic or unidentified diseases. When dealing with biological hazards at this level the use of a Hazmat suit and a self-contained oxygen supply is mandatory. The entrance and exit of a Level Four biolab will contain multiple showers, a vacuum room, an ultraviolet light room, autonomous detection system, and other safety precautions designed to destroy all traces of the biohazard. Multiple airlocks are employed and are electronically secured to prevent both doors opening at the same time. All air and water service going to and coming from a Biosafety Level 4 (P4) lab will undergo similar decontamination procedures to eliminate the possibility of an accidental release.
Symptoms:
Status:
confirmed
21.07.2012
Epidemic
Sierra Leone
Northern Province, [Port Loko, Kambia, Pujehun and Kailahun districts]
Director of Disease Prevention and Control at the Ministry of Health and Sanitation, Dr. Amara Jambai, has yesterday disclosed that the outbreak of cholera in Port Loko, Kambia, Pujehun and Kailahun districts and the Western Area has claimed 62 lives so far. Speaking to journalists at the weekly press briefing at the Ministry of Information and Communications, Dr. Jambai said the outbreak, which started in three districts but has extended to other parts of the country, should be a serious concern to the government and people of Sierra Leone. Dr. Jambai explained adding that 26 cholera deaths have been reported in Kambia, 22 in Port Loko, nine in Pujehun and another nine in the Western Area which sum up to 62 cholera cases reported since January to date. “We have set up cholera treatment units at Macaulay Street and Connaught hospital with three more to follow. Also, we have provided technical assistance, drugs and rapid diagnostic test kits at various locations across the country,” he added to highlight measures his department has put in place to curtail the situation. He however warned that despite efforts by the health ministry to cub the outburst, people should be more careful about their food and water sources and should endeavour to always keep their environment clean.
Biohazard name:
Cholera Outbreak
Biohazard level:
2/4 Medium
Biohazard desc.:
Bacteria and viruses that cause only mild disease to humans, or are difficult to contract via aerosol in a lab setting, such as hepatitis A, B, and C, influenza A, Lyme disease, salmonella, mumps, measles, scrapie, dengue fever, and HIV. “Routine diagnostic work with clinical specimens can be done safely at Biosafety Level 2, using Biosafety Level 2 practices and procedures. Research work (including co-cultivation, virus replication studies, or manipulations involving concentrated virus) can be done in a BSL-2 (P2) facility, using BSL-3 practices and procedures. Virus production activities, including virus concentrations, require a BSL-3 (P3) facility and use of BSL-3 practices and procedures”, see Recommended Biosafety Levels for Infectious Agents.
A one-year-old boy from Davao City has been found positive for the Enterovirus-71 (EV-71), the mysterious illness that killed dozens of children in Cambodia. Health Secretary Enrique Ona said the screening and confirmatory tests done at the Research Institute of Tropical Medicine (RITM) revealed that of the eight suspected Hand, Foot and Mouth Disease (HFMD) patients, one was tested positive of the virus similar to the ones in Cambodia. Ona clarified, however, that the boy has no history of travel outside the country. “The virus is similar to Cambodia but this case is the mild one,” Ona told reporters in a press conference Friday. EV-71 causes diarrhea; rashes; and hand, foot and mouth disease; and is sometimes associated with severe central neurological disease. The virus, which was earlier tagged as a “mystery disease” in Cambodia, caused the deaths of 52 children there. Based on the details of the case, the official said the boy had developed fever and rashes on his hands, soles of feet, mouth and buttocks last July 6. He was brought for consultation at a local health facility but was subsequently sent home and has since recovered very well, Ona said. Although the victim’s family members have no sickness, they are still being closely monitored for possible manifestation of symptoms such as high fever, chest and muscle pain, sore throat and headache, Ona said.
Meantime, two HFMD patients were found negative of human Enterovirus while the five others will be further tested for Coxsackie A16, which is also associated with HFMD, the health official said. The health official said there is no vaccine on EV-71 yet, so the “approach is to monitor the cases.” Ona, however, reiterated that the incident should not come as a surprise to the public since EV-71 is not new to the Philippines. “This virus could have been here all along… Maybe, this specific strain has not been examined before, therefore, it has not been identified in the past,” Ona said. The DOH had already related in the past that there have been cases of human Enterovirus in the country but that they are not the fatal ones like those found in Cambodia. Meanwhile, the health department strongly urged the public to always maintain personal hygiene and cleanliness as this would be the best way against the virus. “Prevention relies on individual personal hygiene and hand washing; shared toys or teaching tools in daycare should be cleaned, washed and disinfected as they easily become contaminated,” said Ona.
Biohazard name:
Enterovirus-71 (EV-71)
Biohazard level:
3/4 Hight
Biohazard desc.:
Bacteria and viruses that can cause severe to fatal disease in humans, but for which vaccines or other treatments exist, such as anthrax, West Nile virus, Venezuelan equine encephalitis, SARS virus, variola virus (smallpox), tuberculosis, typhus, Rift Valley fever, Rocky Mountain spotted fever, yellow fever, and malaria. Among parasites Plasmodium falciparum, which causes Malaria, and Trypanosoma cruzi, which causes trypanosomiasis, also come under this level.
Building on previous work with the botanical abscisic acida, researchers in the Nutritional Immunology and Molecular Medicine Laboratory (NIMML) have discovered that abscisic acid has anti-inflammatory effects in the lungs as well as in the gut. The results will be published in the Journal of Nutritional Biochemistry.
“While the immune effects of abscisic acid are well understood in the gut, less was known about its effects in the respiratory tract. We’ve shown definitively that not only does abscisic acid ameliorate disease activity and lung inflammatory pathology, it also aids recovery and survival in influenza-infected mice,” said Raquel Hontecillas, Ph.D., study leader, assistant professor of immunology at Virginia Bioinformatics Institute, and co-director of NIMML.
Influenza accounts for anywhere from 3,000 to 49,000 deaths per year in the United States alone, according to the Centers for Disease Control. It is difficult to treat if not caught immediately; antivirals usually become ineffective after the virus incubation period has passed and resistance to antiviral drugs poses a serious public health problem in the face of outbreaks.
Abscisic acid, however, has been shown to be most effective at about seven to ten days into the infection, targeting the immune response rather than the virus itself, which many researchers feel is a safer way to reduce flu-associated fatalities.
“Most drugs for respiratory infections target the virus itself, rather than the inflammatory responses caused by the virus. Abscisic acid activates peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor-gamma, a receptor that aids in reducing inflammation, through a newly identified pathwaya but it does so without the side effects of other agonists like thiazolidinediones, which are known to have strong adverse side effects.
The development of complementary and alternative Medicine approaches that modulate the host response has great promise in decreasing respiratory damage caused by influenza or other respiratory pathogens,” said Josep Bassaganya-Riera, Ph.D., director of NIMML and professor of nutritional immunology at the Virginia Bioinformatics Institute.
From this and previous research, it’s clear that abscisic acid could yield a novel new way to combat inflammatory disease, both in the gut and the respiratory tract. By using host-targeted strategies to mediate disease, alternate pathways can be established to activate immune responses without the deadly side effects of many drugs currently on the market.
MessageToEagle.com – Mathematicians have discovered a new way to crinkle up the fabric of space-time, at least in theory.
“We show that space-time cannot be locally flat at a point where two shock waves collide,” said Blake Temple, professor of mathematics at UC Davis.
“This is a new kind of singularity in general relativity.”
The results are reported in two papers by Temple with graduate students Moritz Reintjes and Zeke Vogler, respectively, both published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society A.
Einstein’s theory of general relativity explains gravity as a curvature in space-time. But the theory starts from the assumption that any local patch of space-time looks flat, Temple said.
A singularity is a patch of space-time that cannot be made to look flat in any coordinate system, Temple said. One example of a singularity is inside a black hole, where the curvature of space becomes extreme.
Temple and his collaborators study the mathematics of how shockwaves in a perfect fluid can affect the curvature of space-time in general relativity.
In earlier work, Temple and collaborator Joel Smoller, the Lamberto Cesari professor of mathematics at the University of Michigan, produced a model for the biggest shockwave of all, created from the Big Bang when the universe burst into existence.
A shockwave creates an abrupt change, or discontinuity, in the pressure and density of a fluid, and this creates a jump in the curvature.But it has been known since the 1960s that the jump in curvature created by a single shock wave is not enough to rule out the locally flat nature of space-time.
Vogler’s doctoral work used mathematics to simulate two shockwaves colliding, while Reintjes followed up with an analysis of the equations that describe what happens when shockwaves cross.
He found this created a new type of singularity, which he dubbed a “regularity singularity.”
What is surprising is that something as mild as interacting waves could create something as extreme as a space-time singularity, Temple said.
Illustration of twisted space-time around Earth. Image credit: NASA
Temple and his colleagues are investigating whether the steep gradients in the space-time fabric at a regularity singularity could create any effects that are measurable in the real world.
For example, they wonder whether they might produce gravity waves, Temple said. General relativity predicts that these are produced, for example, by the collision of massive objects like black holes, but they have not yet been observed in nature. Regularity singularities could also be formed within stars as shockwaves pass within them, the researchers theorize.
The algal bloom identified off the west coast is continuing to kill fish and shellfish in significant concentrations from north Galway to north Donegal. Up to 80 per cent of stock has been affected on some oyster farms in Donegal, and it is also having a negative impact on sea angling tourism, the Marine Institute has confirmed. The bloom is caused by Karenia mikimotoi, a phytoplankton of the dinoflagellate group which caused a red tide in 2005 that killed wild fish and shellfish. Samples of this new bloom, first detected in May, are being collected for Marine Institute monitoring by the Irish Coast Guard search and rescue helicopters. Marine Institute phytoplankton expert Joe Silke said the bloom was naturally occurring. It was not associated with pollution but contained a “toxic irritant” that damaged gills of shellfish, fish and invertebrates. Irish Farmers’ Association fish farm section chief executive Richie Flynn said if there was a “properly functioning” licensing system in place, farmers could take measures to move stock when such blooms occurred.
Biohazard name:
Red Tide
Biohazard level:
0/4 —
Biohazard desc.:
This does not included biological hazard category.
MessageToEagle.com – Some years ago, back in, 2005, over the slopes of Mount Gongga, China all rocks suddenly turned red.
In time, the entire region became known the “Red-Stone-Valley” and today it is a spectacular local tourist attraction.
For many years, scientists have wondered what caused the stones to unexpectedly change color?
Today, scientists can finally offer an explanation what is behind this strange phenomenon.
According to Guoxiang Liu of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Wuhan, Hubei, China, and his colleagues, the rocks became red as a result of a newly discovered variety of the algae Trentepohlia jolithus that suddenly expanded.
The stones suddenly changed color. Image credit: Guoxiang Liu
In their research paper, Liu and his colleagues write that ” Trentepohlia is a genus of subaerial green algae which is widespread in tropical, subtropical, and also temperate regions with humid climates”.The scientists state that the reason the algae Trentepohlia jolithus started to expand is due to global warming as well as various human activities.
“This new variety only grows on the native rock, both global warming and human activity have provided massive areas of suitable substrata: the rocks surfaces of the Yajiageng river valley floodplain were re-exposed because of heavy debris flows in the summer of 2005; plus human activities such as tourism and road-building have also created a lot of exposed rock!” Liu and his team write.
Red-Stone-Valley and the stones covered with Trentepohlia-carpets.
2A-2B: Red-stone Valley and the Yajiageng River; 2C: Red Trentepohlia-carpet in a cold winter; 2D: Trentepohlia growing on stone walls near the road; 2E: Red-Stone-Valley and Yajiageng River; 2F-2G: Red-Stone-Valley in foggy conditions; 2H: Tibetan Ni-ma stack with Trentepohlia growing on it. 2I: Red-Stone-Valley in winter. Image credit: PLoS One
Microscopic view of Trentepohlia jolithus. Image credit: PLoS One
Today, most of the rocks are covered with deep red colored algal carpets in the Yajiageng river valley.
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Smoke and ash billow from North Maluku’s Gamalama on Sunday. (Antara Photo/Rosa Panggabean)
Fatima Domingpe applies sunscreen to her face near the Mosaic Fountain in downtown Silver Spring, Maryland, on Saturday, July 7. A record heat wave has been in the area for more than a week.
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MessageToEagle.com – TW Hydrae is a star between 5-10 million years old, and only 176 light-years away, in the direction of the constellation of Hydrae (the Water Snake), is in the final stage of formation.
A schematic diagram of the surface of TW Hydrae, illustrating where strong X-ray emission might arise. Accreting material can produce winds and shocks at the stellar photosphere; some parameters are specified. Credit: N. Brickhouse, et al, 2010
MessageToEagle.com – There are a number of amazing alien landscapes on Earth and here is one of them!
Trees are covered under the snow. Image credit: Niccolo Bonfadini / Solent News
Bizarre tendrils emerge from the ground… Image credit: Niccolo Bonfadini / Solent News
Snow and frost become so thick the entire landscape is transformed into an otherworldly planet. Image credit: Niccolo Bonfadini / Solent News
Here the temperatures can drop as low as -40C. Image credit: Niccolo Bonfadini / Solent News
MessageToEagle.com – Two eyes can be enough to sometimes give you the feeling you are being watched, but how would you feel if 60 eyes starred at you?
New record for the UK. A flatworm with as many as 60 eyes. Photo credit Brian Eversham. 
MessageToEagle.com – Solar Max is due in the year 2013. NASA scientists make analysis of recent solar activity. and say that it’s still more to come.
An experimental NASA computer model of the incoming CME predicted its arrival at Earth on July 14th. Credit: Goddard Space Weather Lab. animation
MessageToEagle.com – Mathematicians have discovered a new way to crinkle up the fabric of space-time, at least in theory.
MessageToEagle.com – Some years ago, back in, 2005, over the slopes of Mount Gongga, China all rocks suddenly turned red.
Microscopic view of Trentepohlia jolithus. Image credit: PLoS One
